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Driving sustainable economic growth

At Emirates Global Aluminium our purpose is Together, innovating aluminium to make modern life possible. One way we make modern life possible for the societies in which we operate by driving sustainable economic growth.

Our bold aspiration is to double our absolute contribution to the economies of the countries in which we operate by 2040, and steadily improve the quality of our contribution.

In the UAE, EGA’s direct, indirect and induced economic contribution totalled over $7 billion in 2022, more than 1.4 per cent of the entire economy. This supported almost 48 thousand jobs.

In Guinea, the construction of our Guinea Alumina Corporation project was one of the largest greenfield investments in the country in the past four decades. In operation, more than 3,300 people work on GAC’s sites, over 95 per cent Guinean. In 2022, GAC made $225 million of direct expenditures in Guinea, including local procurement, payments to governments, salaries and benefits, and social contributions.

We intend to grow our own business, increase local procurement, and further localise our workforce in both countries.

Growing our own business

Our biggest single contribution to the economies in the countries in which we operate is the value we generate ourselves. EGA has a track record of more than four decades of growth, and we aim to continue growing in the decades to come.

From a small regional aluminium smelter, capable of producing some 135,000 tonnes of metal per year, we have grown into an integrated global aluminium giant.

Today, one-in-every 25 tonnes of aluminium made worldwide is made by EGA in the UAE, and we are an increasingly important global supplier of bauxite, the ore from which aluminium is derived.

Increasing local procurement

Procuring the goods and services we need locally increases the economic benefit of our activities in the countries in which we operate.

EGA prioritises orders from local suppliers whenever they are competitive commercially, encourages international suppliers to establish facilities within the UAE and Guinea, and works with Government and other stakeholders to enable the development of supply industries that do not yet exist in the countries.

In 2021, we spent over $1.79 billion on goods and services procured locally in the UAE, which was 45 per cent of our total procurement spend.

We have joined the Ministry of Industry & Advanced Technology’s in-country value programme, which aims to qualify and prioritise suppliers based on the proportion of their activity that is conducted within the UAE.

In Guinea, 54 per cent of procurement spend in 2021 was with local Guinean companies, totalling $112 million. In 2022 this grew to $146.9 million.

To assist and encourage local businesses in Guinea to tender for contracts, we have developed a specialist training programme providing details related to our tender process, to help suppliers meet the quality and integrity standards we require.

We believe that the development of a local supply chain is vital for Guinea to realise the full economic benefits of its natural resources.

Supplying local customers with metal

EGA supplies almost all the UAE’s primary aluminium needs and is at the heart of a growing broader aluminium sector in our nation.

Today around 10 per cent of EGA’s total production is sold domestically, and some 26 UAE downstream companies use our metal to make products, from window frames to car parts. These companies are located across the country, in every Emirate except Fujairah.

Proximity to our production, along with the UAE’s logistics and other business advantages, means there is potential for the UAE’s downstream aluminium industry to grow further. We work with our existing customers, potential new entrants, and other stakeholders to support this whenever it is commercially-attractive for EGA.