Roma Having Forex Problems

THE only mosquito coil manufacturing company in Guyana, Roma, is striving to maintain standards acceptable to consumers.

Many consumers have begun to complain, however, about having to purchase mosquito coils that were too cold to light because of poor packaging. Others are dissatisfied over the lack of stands in the packets, necessary to hold lighted coils in place.

But Roma which has been manufacturing mosquito coils since 1965, says it has had severe problems.

“Production target of 120,000 coils per day has been reduced by nearly twenty-five per cent,” Mr. Joseph Kartick, the Production Manager said.

“This is due to our inability to acquire most of the raw materials needed and this has created a limit of only three working days per week,” Kartick disclosed.

The company faces difficulties in importing pynamin emulsion, the insecticide used in the production of coils and manachite green, which gives the coil its colour.

Obtaining local materials like coconut shells, cassava starch and saw-dust is also posing a serious problem for Roma.

However, the drug pynamin emulsion is the main ingredient which the company needs to continue production, but foreign exchange is not readily obtained, the manager explained.

According to Mr. Kartick, the boxes used and the stands previously supplied were discontinued because of the high cost.

As a result of reduced production, export markets in the Caribbean have been neglected. Roma started manufacturing coils under franchise from a company in Japan which was Guyana’s mosquito coil supplier.