Pacific International Inc., one of the largest businesses in the Marshall Islands, has ended its 30-year relationship with the government for managing Tobolar Copra Processing Authority, the factory in Majuro that processes dried coconut into coconut oil.
“It’s time to move on,” said PII chief executive officer Jerry Kramer of PII’s decision to get out of managing a factory he built in the late 1970s.
“Tobolar’s management is well-trained and they have an interested board.”
Kramer has also ended two other management contracts for the government — a dry-dock operation and a hotel — focusing his business on construction, housing rental and related businesses in Majuro, Chuuk and Guam.
PII’s management officially ended on Dec. 31, but a few continuing issues are being worked on as part of the transition, he indicated.
Tobolar board chairman Jemi Nashion, an assistant secretary at the Ministry of Finance, confirmed that PII “wanted to get out” of the management, and “based on that, we agreed. As of Dec. 31, PII is no longer part of Tobolar.”
This terminates not only 30-years of management by PII, but ends the involvement of the company that built the facility.
A Honolulu firm will conduct a review of the copra plant later this month that is expected to help the government to develop new products and improve the quality of the oil it sells.
“The assessment of Tobolar will help the board be aware of its current status, opportunities and risks so we can move forward accordingly,” Nashion said Thursday. “We need solid information, which the study will provide. It will help not only to understanding the current situation, but to help Tobolar pursue funding opportunities.”
The Hawaii company that will conduct the study, Oceanic Marshalls Inc., has previously advised the Marshalls Energy Company when it was purchasing the “new” diesel power plant in the late 1990s and has experience in bio-fuel operations.
Nashion said the copra plant needs new equipment to improve its operations. “It needs a major overhaul and funding to do it,” he said.
Tobolar processes about 6,000 tons of copra per year that is brought in from remote atolls where the industry provides virtually the only cash income on these islands.
Kramer said his company began building Tobolar in 1976 and its first million-dollar shipment of oil was exported in 1979.
“The opening of Tobolar (in the late 1970s) broke new ground,” said Kramer. He said at the time the copra industry in the region was controlled by a handful of companies that were exploiting the islands. “Majuro is the last place north of the equator still to be milling copra.”
Kramer said it had not been easy to maintain operations over the years, but with careful management, it had been possible to continue “this important source of income for outer islanders.”
