Province Helps Diversify Manufacturing Exports

ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT--Province Helps Diversify Manufacturing Exports

The province is helping another Nova Scotia manufacturer expand its export product line, create jobs, and further open the door to the offshore fabrication market and other large-scale projects.

A $5.8-million secured, repayable investment will help Cherubini Metal Works of Dartmouth build a new $12.4-million metal- fabrication yard on the waterfront in Eastern Passage.

Contracts secured through the new yard are expected to add at least 50 new jobs to the Cherubini workforce. "These are the kinds of well-paid jobs in the export manufacturing sector that the province has been actively pursuing through our economic growth strategy," said Economic Development Minister Ernest Fage.

The project includes a wharf to deep water, which allows the company to bid on heavy industrial structures like bridges and buildings as well as projects in offshore oil and gas.

The new location is in addition to Cherubini's existing production facilities in the Burnside Industrial Park. Those facilities employ 225 people and will continue to be used. A further 100 people are employed in other companies within the Cherubini group.

Over the last five years, about 75 per cent of Cherubini's sales have been for export. This trend is expected to grow as the firm bids on more diverse export work. "We are preparing tender packages in conjunction with the new facility that could potentially increase sales from 20 per cent to 50 per cent," said general manager Stephen Ross.

"Cherubini has been asked to bid on offshore work and other large projects before," Mr. Ross said, "but couldn't participate because the completed projects would have been too large to transport to deep water from the company's current location in the industrial park."

The company has completed construction of the wharf and this fall began shipping large projects from it, including a marine fender system for New York Harbor and steel superstructure for Voisey's Bay, the world's largest nickel development.

The land for the new fabrication facility has been cleared and graded and the building designs completed. Construction is scheduled to begin over the next several months.