People and places

Abstract

Prior to joining Ansac in July, I was the general manager of Tata Chemical's North American natural soda ash operations and from 2000-2008, I was the company's vice president of sales and marketing. Over the entire 13-year period, I was a member of Ansac's board of directors. Therefore, my experiences from the mine and production site in Green River, through the global supply channels to the end customer, as well as my knowledge of Ansac's operations and its core strengths, provide me with a solid foundation to build on the successes that Ansac has achieved during the past 30 years. The biggest challenge for the global soda ash industry in the year ahead will be the continued economic uncertainty that pervades across much of the world. In 2013, we project global soda ash demand to grow by 2% versus 2012. Historically, global growth has been closer to 3%. This slowdown in growth has forced some of the world's more costly soda ash operations to shut production. Although Ansac and its member companies will see shipments increase in 2013, and is projecting a return to more historic soda ash growth rates in 2014, Ansac's challenge will be to continue to achieve its long-term global growth objectives.