Although the idea of restarting the production of pipes in “Unis” from Derventa has been current since March, it has not moved anywhere from the starting point due to the lack of workers, and the new owner sees the only salvation in the import of foreign labor.
The owner of the “Fructa Trade” chain, Dusan Reljic, who in February of this year bought the property of the pipe factory in bankruptcy for 12.19 million BAM for “Glas Srpske”, says that since March, when the recruitment competition was announced, nothing happened because 60 of them are needed to start just one drive line, and significantly less have applied.
”The only solution to save “Unis” is to import most of the workers from Turkey, Nepal and other countries where there are certainly people interested in working. These are low-skilled workers and there are initiatives to go in that direction. Additionally, we could build a camp next to the company to house those workers. For such jobs, they could find workers in certain African and Asian countries, and the state must get involved as soon as possible in this matter as well,” said Reljic.
According to him, the situation is no better when it comes to facilities and machines that require a lot of investment, and earlier calculations showed that at least 20 million BAM is needed to start production.
”The machines are in the process of being overhauled, they were not well preserved and there are many modifications, but also investments. We have about 20 workers who do that,” said Reljic.
The uncertain market, according to Reljic, is an additional obstacle, but despite everything, he still does not give up on the idea of restarting production in that failed company.
”Despite everything, we still do not lose hope that we will do something. We are still negotiating with partners from Italy, but they condition everything on the number of workers, which we have not been able to provide until now. They don’t want to wait, and neither the local nor the republic authorities have shown interest in getting involved in this story,” noted Reljic.
The bankruptcy in “Unis” was opened on December 17th, 2019, and the assets of the company were valued at more than 40 million BAM, and it was decided to sell everything as a whole. The first three auctions failed, and in the fourth, the company was owned by the company “Fructa Trade“.
A fight for every man
Dusan Reljic points out that he will wait for the annual vacations to pass, after which it would be possible to know more about the fate of the former economic giant.
”A similar situation exists in the entire economy. People search for workers on every corner, there is a lack of them in catering, trade, almost in every branch. Simply, there is fight for every man,” said Reljic.
