Business as usual for PetChem

KUALA LUMPUR: Petronas Chemicals Group Bhd (PetChem) is monitoring the United States-China trade war.

Managing director and chief executive officer Datuk Sazali Hamzah said it was business as usual for PetChem.

“We have not seen the impact yet. But in the long term, it would not be good as China is a big country and when it is affected, it will affect the whole region.

“We believe the industry will normalise although we are unsure how long that will take. As of now, there is no serious threat to our businesses and our customers in China are still pursuing collaborations with PetChem.

“We are also looking to leverage China’s curb on coal-based plants as the alternative is ethylene gas, which we are the producer, and this has been good for us in the last two years,” he said on the sidelines of the Asia Petrochemical Industry Conference 2018, here, yesterday.

Sazali also said PetChem had not been directly impacted by the Turkish and Indian currency market fluctuations as it traded in the US dollar.

Sazali said PetChem was looking into what could be done further downstream rather than upstream.

“For our growth strategy, we are still focusing on the Rapid project which we are on track.”