Good morning everyone and welcome to Omnia's Financial R esults for the year ended 31st March 2024. My name is Nerina Bodasing, I'm the group executive for marketing and Investor Relations and on behalf of the Omnia Exco , we are really excited to share our results with you today. Before we do so, safety is a core value of Omnia and in line with this I would like to welcome our executive for legal and compliance, Siphiwe Duli, who will take you through a safety moment.
Good morning everyone and a warm welcome to all our visitors today. Thank you for coming to share this very important day with us. As it's customary in gatherings like this, we always begin with a safety share. Today's safety share is related to this cold weather in winter today in Johannesburg and other parts of the country. During this time, many people use all sorts of heat and equipment to warm their homes, their workspaces and themselves. These include open flame fireplaces, gas fireplaces, gas heaters and electric heaters and air conditioning equipment.
All of these introduce a fire risk of some sort, which is generally not usually available in warmer conditions with open fire flames. We ought to make sure that there are no mats or other things close to the open fire as a spark from this may actually cause a fire in the house with the risk of life and also burning the building. With gas heaters and gas fireplaces, it is important to ensure that an expert comes and take a look at the gas pipes to make sure that there are no leaks because if there are leaks, an ignition of a spark may cause a fire in the house. With respect to electric heaters and air conditions, this tends to draw a lot of electricity from the grid.
It's important to have an electrician to make sure that the wire connections in the plugs and the DB boxes are actually tight because if they are not, there will be a spark that may start a fire. When I was preparing for this, I practiced a little bit at home and asked my daughter to watch and give me feedback. She definitely was not impressed. She didn't like it at all. She said it was torture. However, she said I must also add one last thing to the list of equipment I've just discussed and that is a hot water bottle. She said they told them at school that because in summer, when summer comes, we peg them somewhere often with sharp objects which may pierce them and if winter starts and you just put hot water in it, the hot water might leak and cause burns.
They also told them at school that with our electricity problems with Eskom, it's not always necessary to heat the water to a maximum boil. You can just make it hot enough so that you can put it in the bottle because if it's too hot for a few minutes, you can't do anything about it. You'll be extremely impressed that I told you this about it today. So, without further ado, and at that extraordinary note, thank you very much for coming and I hope you enjoy the rest of the morning.
Thank you, Siphiwe , for those important words. We will now proceed with the formal results presentation. We have Seelan Gobalsamy, our CEO, who's going to take you through the group's performance. Ditebogo Malatsi , who is our executive for SHEQ and Sustainability, will go through the performance of our safety indicators and ESG. Stephan Serfontein , our finance director, will take you through the details of the financials and Seelan will then close off and open the floor for questions. I now hand over to Seelan.
Thank you very much, Nerina and Siphiwe, and a warm welcome to all of our shareholders and staff stakeholders in the room and a warm welcome to all of the folk on the line. Thanks for joining us on the line and we appreciate you making the time to be here. I'm going to talk through a few slides and then I'm going to hand over to Ditebogo . It's a very proud moment for me to be standing here today after our 225th board meeting that we had last week and ending the 70-year celebrations that we had last year and share what is an incredibly resilient and great performance by our organization for this financial period. I think what we all know is that companies, people, countries across the world all need a very strong purpose and purpose.
A purpose-led business or purpose-led strategy is one that is the most sustainable and lasts over time. So if I start right there, I think it's important just to remind ourselves of what Omnia's purpose is. And we redefined that and we worked through that with our thousands of people over the last few years. And that purpose is innovate, innovating to enhance life and together creating a greener future. Our business is positively disposed to food security. Our business is ensuring that the world has food, the world has nourishment and people are fed. Our business is also about ensuring that minerals are extracted, jobs are created, countries have the GDP that that agriculture and mining sectors produce. And finally we want to do all of that in a sustainable way, in a way that leaves the planet a better place than what we found it.
What you're going to see today is not just what we do in terms of our footprint in our businesses, in our production facilities, in our supply chain and in our distribution facilities, but we're also going to see a bit about how we enhance that impact for our customers. So how do our farmers, our growers, our mines, also benefit from the great customer value propositions we have that are underpinned by strong, strong ESG principles at a high level? You know, this is our scorecard. Siphiwe said safety is incredibly important to us. So we're proud to show today a further reduction in our recordable case count. We have two businesses that have RCR levels at zero and we continue to manage lead and lag indicators across our business. Ditebogo will take you through a number of the elements of that.
I think the second big story we're going to show you and share with you today, and we've done a number of additional slides in terms of disclosure, is how the diversification strategy between agriculture and mining has played out throughout our business. So both our mining business and our agriculture business has delivered just under ZAR 1 billion worth of profit each. You see the diversification strategies we put in mining delivering real value for us. And furthermore, we will show you some slides later on in the deck how we've diversified globally and how our international earnings has also filtered through the results. This mining performance was delivered against a huge amount of global volatility and supply chain disruption. And both our mining and our agriculture delivered this resilient performance in a very, very volatile and declining commodity cycle.
A number of our shareholders asked us to demonstrate how business performs in a low commodity cycle, in a rising commodity cycle, in a volatile commodity cycle, and then also in a declining commodity cycle. You'll see a number of additional slides we've put in the deck to unpack that and show you how we've changed our business and fashioned our business to be more resilient in these different cycles. A very strong performance in our agribusiness despite this lower commodity cycle. I think the story that we also put out today, which is incredible, is our cash generation. Very, very strong cash generation. You see how our business has managed working capital, how it's managed debtors, stock, creditors and profits incredibly well. A strong net balance at the end of the year and that's resulted in this disciplined, consistent return to shareholders.
So we will talk a little bit later about the current period's distribution, but cumulatively, since our rights issue, we've returned more than ZAR 4 billion back to shareholders, which is a remarkable position to be in. And I think it demonstrates the disciplined execution of our strategy. The first part of our presentation is around our safety and our ESG stats. And I'm going to ask Ditebogo , who is our group head of safety, ESG and CSI, to do that part of the presentation for me. And I'm going to please remind her not to stress these are all very nice people in the room and in the camera. So please enjoy sharing the remarkable work you're doing for us. Thank you.
Thank you, Seelan, and morning, everyone. I almost feel like I have the easy part of today because I actually get to share with everybody how we living our purpose. We speak about how safety and ESG are important to us, but we also evidence this in the investments that we make in safety performance. And what you're seeing up here is just how we're evidencing that the safety of our people, our assets and communities are actually critical to what we do. We've invested in our leadership, owning safety. We've got what we call visible and felt leadership. And we ask for our leadership to actually be on the ground, to be inside, to be able to interact with our staff members. We've got shared culture and value of safety.
You may see for those that are in the room outside that we've got four pillars and those are four core values that we live by, one of which is be safe. That promotes physical safety and it promotes psychological safety. From a physical safety perspective, we're saying that we know that it's important to invest in the maintenance of our facilities. From a psychological safety perspective, we encourage our staff and our managers to be free enough to open up and speak when they see that there's a potential harmful action that someone is taking and potential harmful conditions, because in knowing that, we're able to react and fix it. I think lastly, we continue to invest in the training of our people from a safety perspective because. Because the more you know, the better you can do.
Essentially, the next is we've invested in our impact on natural resources. I think at half year we spoke about how we've got a 10 MW solar plant that has been commissioned at our Sasolburg plant. And I think we're grateful to say that we actually have an additional 5 MW that's also starting construction during the financial year as well. We have commissioned two, albeit slightly smaller solar plants at our mining and manufacturing facilities. But that just shows our commitment to saying we want to use more renewable and green sources of energy in our manufacturing facilities. From a water perspective, last year we spoke about the reverse osmosis plant in Sasolburg and I'm also once again so happy to say that we've extended that to our mining and manufacturing plants with a second reverse osmosis plant coming online in Dryden.
But we don't only invest in our impact on natural resources internally; we want to share this with our customers. We want to help our customers to be able to reduce their carbon footprint. And during the year we bought a stake in Hypex Bio, which is a Swedish-based company. And what this solution does is it provides alternative explosive solutions. It's going to be able to provide alternative blasting solutions to our customers. So currently traditional blasting solutions are nitrate based and those do have higher NOx emissions. And the idea is that when we do commission this, when we do commercialize this, we're able to help our customers to be able to reduce their own environmental footprint. What this slide shows is this, I guess, the fruits of our labor, for lack of a better phrase.
We've put so much money, so much effort, people's time in properly investing in ESG and we're seeing that this has visible, I'm going to say visible measurements. We can visibly see that our carbon emissions are reducing. Our renewable energy has actually doubled compared to last year. This is the renewable energy that we use internally. We're continuously increasing the use of recycled water in our plants and in our products. And from a mining perspective, we're increasingly using waste oil in emulsion. So that further enhances how our products actually speak to the ESG value that we say we want to build in our organization. Central to our being able to deliver value to all our stakeholders is of course our people. We create value from various investments.
Therefore, the investment in our people and this is the investment in us being able to have a shared culture, a shared value. Our purpose speaks to, to what it is, why we do what we do, but the how we do what we do it needs to be very consistent across organization. We've invested last year in the refresh of and it's not last year, I think it's been two years now. The refresh of our culture program. We've refreshed our purpose and now we're saying how do we make that purpose possible? And this is through the four core values. The first one was the Be Safe which I spoke to earlier. The next one is how do we do what we do earlier. We want to work together to achieve excellence together. We always want to do what is right.
I think a lot of the time we're also very hard on ourselves but it's because this value is also very important to us. But I think lastly we're also committed to our own development and the development of others. We see this and we've done this, we've evidenced this in the investment of the development of our leadership, the development of our employees, but also the generations to follow. This has been done through bursaries for school going children and tertiary children and we've also done this with the youth through our learnership and learnerships and graduate programs across the multiple disciplines. Our people have been central to the turnaround of Omnia and in 2021 around 2,500 staff were all issued a stake in Omnia. I think about 300 shares per person. This is across the board.
We're quite glad and happy to say that this year those shares will be vesting. So the hard work and sweat and tears that our people have put into the organization making sure that we are where we are today. And they've been receiving dividends over the past three years, but this year they also have the shares that they now own in their own names. And lastly, well, second to last, not even lastly. We know that we work in mostly remote communities and what we say is that we want to invest in the social impact that we deliver in our communities. But we're also purposeful about how we do this. It has to be aligned to our purpose and it has to be aligned to our core business.
We know that the population is growing, it's going to need food and they're going to need sources of income. So in our social impact approach, social investment approach, we look at two areas, the first being food security. So we enable people to be able to grow food to feed themselves but we also try to graduate those that do have access to land to be small scale farmers that can now grow food to generate income for themselves. And we currently have 169 of these in our programs. And I guess the next step is with our partners like Real Life and Afrika Tikkun being able to gain access to or rather having aggregation and access to markets for as an offtake from these small scale farmers. The second is math and science is central to future careers, specifically in mining and in agriculture.
Omnia has always championed the development of good medicine science outcomes. This is the second CSI pillar that we continue to support. The idea is that people, regardless of their background, should be able to have to gain access to careers or entrepreneurship opportunities in STEM related careers. Lastly, this is a slide that we haven't shown before, is just bringing all our investments together, is evidencing how we create value and we share this value with various parts with various stakeholders across our group. I'm now going to hand back over to Seelan who's going to, I guess, show further evidence how we have created this value and how we continue to share this value in the coming years.
Thank you. Thank you, Ditebogo . I think it's a proud moment for us to show that all of our stakeholders are important and all of our stakeholders have a major, important, impactful role to play on our business. It reminds us of when we did our rights issue a few years ago, you know, when shareholders invested capital in our company to keep our company going. And now it is a proud moment to see how we've been able to apply and distribute those benefits to all of our stakeholders. Thank you, thank you, thank you very much for that. Just on if I can move forward and go to a business update. I think it's always important before we look at the detailed numbers to understand the context, the environment that Omnia operated in over the last few months and years.
I think it's fair to say that we operate in a very complex, volatile and uncertain macro environment. We've had to navigate the storms of the geopolitical uncertainty globally. So you've seen how the Russia-Ukraine war impacted and changed commodity prices. We've seen the Suez Canal being blocked and the changes in shipping routes and movements of goods over the last few years. You know, we have lately seen some of the local matters that have also disrupted supply chain globally. We've seen inflation, we've seen cost pressures, and I think overall weather conditions. Whether it's in our business in Australia, whether it's in India, whether it's in South Africa, whether it's in Canada. We've seen climate change also affect the way we go about doing things. I think some of the result of that is the change in commodity prices.
We've got a number of slides that we will talk through that a little bit later. Locally our plants have been plagued with all of the issues around energy, water supply chain disruption, port disruption and shipping disruption. We've also seen mining production not be as high as we would like it to do. In spite of all of that, what you will see is an incredibly resilient performance by our business. You will see that we've been able to deliver incredible profits and cash results if we take this macro environment. I try and summarize the north. So where did we point our group to? Where did we say this is where we're going over the last few years? This is a little bit of our roadmap. Let me just talk through this just for one minute.
Some of this is a little bit old, some of this you would have seen, but some of this also demonstrates that what we say we're going out to do, we go out to do it in a very systematic, in a very considered way. So the first block we said, we want to stabilize our balance sheet. We want to stabilize and fix our capital structure. We want to relook at our operating model. We want to be very disciplined about where we invest capital and where we extract capital. We want to improve our plant performance. We want to manage our working capital better and you'll see all of the delivery in that space. But we also told you, you know, we want to enhance our skills to win with a customer. So we want to continuously win new customers in agriculture and mining.
We want to invest in our R& D capability and we also want to invest in ESG underpinned solutions, and Ditebogo Malatsi talks about that quite articulately. And then furthermore, we want to grow our business. We want to grow our business from a diversification perspective. So we want a larger mining business, we want a larger agriculture business, but we also want a larger mining and agriculture business globally. And what you will see today is how we've progressed on that path and how we've been able to allocate capital. But also look at the quality and the texture of our earnings and show you how they have changed based on this north, based on where we've been pointing and what we executed on.
So I think disciplined capital allocation underpinned by strong ESG principles and focused on protecting what we've got in our SADC core and growing that core, but also growing our business internationally. We put in place an operating model and you'll see every year we refine this a little bit. So, you know, previously we had Oro Agri in here, we had an Umongo in here. And now you start seeing some of our JVs, you know, be a little bit more prominent on this chart. Our joint venture in Canada, which is going incredibly well, and also our joint venture in Indonesia, which is, which is a little bit ahead of our expectations with only some of the contracts in. And you see the contribution it is making to our mining segment.
Already we been investing heavily in our integrated manufacturing and supply chain and we will show you some tangible results from that space and how that manufacturing and supply chain has been able to decouple our earnings to the major changes in the commodity prices. We start pointing again to how those investments have delivered value for our business. We now start telling you about our investment in Hypex Bio. Ditebogo started with it. But we've got a few more slides in the deck to tell you why we've deployed circa ZAR 200 million into that business in Sweden and why we've built and secured these distribution arrangements for our mining business across the world. What we also will keep telling you and keep reminding ourselves on is that you know, our business must be underpinned by safety and sustainability. What has that resulted in?
So here's our scorecard. Our revenue down 16% with a backdrop of commodity prices in some instances down 50%. Our gross profit of ZAR 4.8 billion. An incredible performance with a backdrop of the commodity decline. Our gross margins up and I'll come to the shareholder piece a little bit later. Our operating profit slightly down. However, both our core businesses delivering just under ZAR 1 billion worth of profit. An unbelievable achievement. Our operating margin at a group level just around the target range and Stephan's got some nice slides to talk about how we did that, you know, which businesses performed slightly below and slightly above and how the diversification of our businesses worked well for us. Our profit pretty much flat year-on-year and our return on capital slightly down from where we would have liked it to be.
That's driven largely by one or two businesses where that earnings were not where we would like them to have been. We'll talk a little bit about that, Protea being one of them. A very strong net cash position. I think that's driven by earnings. It's also driven by prudent working capital which we'll show you a little bit later. That's the next measure. Then finally our shareholder distribution. You know, when we looked, when the board met and looked at our business and when we looked at the amount of capital or cash we had, the capital we set aside to be deployed in the business, you know, we felt it prudent to distribute an ordinary dividend of ZAR 3.75 a share, a special dividend of ZAR 3.25 a share.
Obviously you all know that we've had a share buyback program in place since our last AGM. So incredible delivery overall. And let's talk a little bit about the key aspects in the detail that caused this. When we think of our earnings and our profits, we've set a measure for ourselves which is operating profit margin. And here what you can see is how our diversification strategy worked. Where our Protea business was fairly hard hit by the challenges in the South African environment, the port disruptions, the infrastructure issues, a decline in the manufacturing sector and our Protea business performed way below our expectations.
While we understand the headwinds that it faced and we understand the issues that cause that, you know, we have enhanced our team, we've enhanced the focus in our team to get that business back to where we would, where we would like it to be. Our mining business, by far the star performer. Both the Mining Chemicals business, the Mining International business outside of the African continent, the mining business on the African continent, in particularly West Africa, all performed incredibly strongly. Some cost efficiencies coming through there, but more importantly, customer wins. We see our mining business continue continually win. Customers win market share and grow both globally and locally. Our agriculture segment, which includes our agribusiness and our manufacturing plants had a downturn obviously because of the commodity prices.
That was offset by some strong, strong volumes in the South African agri market and that was also negatively impacted by some of the performance in SADC. We've seen a lot of headwinds in our SADC businesses, Zambia and Zimbabwe. In the agriculture space, our Humates business in Australia, the AgriBio business continues to perform strongly. Great propositions. Some of the challenges we faced with two customers having operational issues has now been sorted out and the business continues to invest in distribution and continues to grow its volumes. I think what is particularly pleasing in that business, its GP margins and its OP margins continue to be held at very, very high levels and Stephan will show a slide on that a little bit later. I guess all of that blended together puts our group just about in the target range.
I think what you can see is that if we have a little bit headwind we will be better in the target range. But certainly the diversification of mining and agri has worked, worked very well for us. What we have done from a group perspective, we've ensured security of supply to our customers. I think I'm incredibly proud of our team, you know, making sure that when customers needed ammonia based mining products, when customers needed fertilizer, when other suppliers ran out, when ports were disrupted, the Omnia Group was able to leverage its own infrastructure, its rail wagons, its storage, its agile supply chain and ensure that we were able to serve the markets that we operate and we did all of that managing our working capital, managing our cash and managing our margins really well.
Now we tried to put a slide to talk a little bit deeper about the commodity price impact into our business. What we did here is we're showing a five year horizon of how commodity prices moved. So if I broad brush this slide, what we're showing is in a low commodity environment, we were successful in growing our earnings, we then had an increasing commodity environment. So at that point you should say, what does that mean for your business? How resilient are you? You know, you're now going to need more cash, you're going to have customers under pressure, you're going to have other dynamics that play out. You're going to have to buy and sell at different points in the cycle. And we show how we've grown through the rising commodity cycle.
All through this you have volatility, so you have us needing to buy and sell at different points in the cycle. So our team have to be incredibly awake at the wheel and decide when to buy, when to sell, how much to make. And you'll see in a later slide, what we'll show you is how we've managed our stock positions through this, how we've managed our working capital positions through this. And then what we show is what we started talking about in half year and last year is the precipitous decline of the commodity prices. So as the commodity price fell, geez, you know, what does that mean for our business? How did we manage our stock, our GP, our margins? And then it lifted again and now it is where it is.
What you can see, there's a slide here that's got half years, it's got full years. There's another slide, I think in the back of the deck that Stephan and the team can share with you. But you can see how resilient our business has been. For the first time now we can show you our performance in a low commodity cycle, a rising commodity cycle, volatile cycle again, declining cycle and then a slightly uptick. You can see that we are able to manage our business on an agile basis. We are in very well placed and very awake at the wheel to look forward and make the decisions that are needed to manage our business in the next cycles that we face.
We've been able broadly to hold our GP margins and we've been able to grow broadly our OP margins during that, during that cycle. There are areas obviously where you can see where we've made bigger decisions in terms of stock, you know, and had to manage the position fairly tightly. What we also said is we want to grow and optimize our manufacturing capability and it's been very difficult to articulate how we've delivered on that score. So the team, we applied ourselves and we said, let's give our shareholders a little bit of information to tell you what does this integrated manufacturing and supply chain, what has it delivered? So we've told you a lot about what it does. Let's show you what is delivered. So bear with me with the worms.
I know some people love worms, some people don't love these wormy charts, but in essence, what we say from FY 2019 to FY 2024, we've doubled. So the 100- 204. It's just scaled. We've doubled the amount of third party ammonia derivative tonnes out of our manufacturing plant. So what that means is we've built a new business which we stood up here a few years ago and told you about, that we would sell our product on a wholesale basis into the mining market and we've doubled that over the period. Now, I guess what that does is it has a direct correlation on where is that tonnes going to come from. And our engineers, our plant managers and others then did an incredible job to increase the nitric acid production by roughly 30% over that period to allow us to build this additional value generator business.
And I think broadly, you know, most of, you know, segments, you know that we've got our production plant in agri and we've got a mining segment. So there's value that's generated across our business because of this, you know, at the end of day it gets blended and it gets put into our overall group result and our operating margin. The second thing, as Ditebogo was speaking about investments in ESG, we often think that investments in ESG is a donation for us. It's not a donation for us, it's a real investment to do what's right, to do what's right for the world, but also to do what's right for our business. And we challenged ourselves to say the money we've put in solar, the money we've put in reverse osmosis, the money we've put in other initiatives like our catalytic converters and others.
How has that helped us in terms of our utility spend? And the chart on the right is, is showing that we've been able to grow our utility spend per tonne below inflation due to those investments. So what you're seeing is real value being generated from our ESG underpinned investments. And I think it's a great space to be in because we do know that our utility costs are growing ahead of inflation for each one of us in this room. We're paying more for electricity, more for transport, more for water than we've ever paid. And companies have to manage that very prudently. These investments, though, we've made them over years. You would have heard us talk about our first solar plant a number of years ago as you walked in, or you look at some of our pictures on our website.
You now see us having a 10 MW plant. I mean, it's a fascinating thing to see and I think it demonstrates the North Star strategy that we pointed to, but then also the execution of our teams to deliver that. So our manufacturing area does not just deliver safe and reliable operations. It actually positions us for growth, it actually positions us to enhance our earnings and enhances our customer competitiveness. If I talk further about the supply chain and manufacturing, the next thing I just wanted to lift out of the detail was our stock management. With a backdrop of this volatile commodity prices that we've seen. And you can see we're talking over four years here now. So we're not just talking about the current year. We've also been continuously being able to manage our stock more effectively.
We've been able to reduce our stock conversion cycle, and there are two different cycles. So our mining business is much shorter. It's got a lower correlation to ammonia prices because there are other things in the mining business. And our agribusiness has a longer cycle because it has the traditional fertilizer cycle in it. And managing that, we've been able to reduce the amount of stock that we carry. We've been able to manage that more prudently, which means the amount of cash we utilize is less. But it also means that the commodity price risk we take is reducing and is being better managed. So when we cast our mind back to that GP slide on the OP slide around how we've performed through the cycles, you know, this is the other underpin that has delivered an immense amount of value for us.
I mean, obviously in the current period, what you can see is the stock buildup. You know, we've broken the traditional correlation of just building stock up and reducing stock. Post the planting season, our teams have been working a lot more agile to see how we can build stock up slower, how we can sell stock differently. I guess this chart is agriculture, South Africa. You can see how well it's done. I guess if you ask me where we can do a lot more and where there's a lot more value to be unlocked, it's probably in the agriculture sector, SADC area, you know, where the cycles are a little bit longer, it's a little bit more complex to get some of the government contracts and the stock moved faster and more efficiently the way it is moved here that we would like.
This is credit to our integrated supply chain. It's credit to our agile teams matching the supply, the manufacturing and the demand and also the ability to optimize. Now between mining agri local and Agri SADC , the end result of that is our net working capital. So you'll see we changed this slide. Stephan wanted the slide changed. Initially I didn't want to, but eventually I said, okay, we're going with Stephan slide. So the old slide is still there. It's at the back of the pack if you were to see the old slide. But the key messages on this slide, which he reminds me of, is that Agri SA, you can see the working capital coming out as the commodity price declined.
So exactly to model what we expected, you know, he then knocks me over the head a little bit and says, look, your Agri SADC is a little bit not where we want it to be. So we could have taken some more working capital out there. So this working capital position could be a little bit more strong, maybe circa ZAR 300 million-ZAR 400 million lower than where it is. But you know, our Agri SADC business, you know, could have done a bit better. And then obviously if you take Mining Chemicals and others, you know, the working capital managed very prudently throughout our business. And we will never let our eye off the working capital management because we know what happened here a number of years ago. So I think still more to be done there.
We've spoken about what our head of supply chain has done around supply chain finance previously. You know, if we're closing that cash conversion cycle, it benefits us here. So while it's a very good performance, I think we do know this could have been a bit better, which is a great position to be in. Then this is a new picture and this picture is demonstrating our efforts around diversification. Now there's two, there's another slide coming after this, but there's two diversification benefits we're going to speak to. The first one here is really just showing you how the international profits in our business has grown. Our mining international profits has grown with a CAGR of 31% over this period. This is a new slide which you wouldn't have seen before. Our Agri International profits has grown by 13% over this period.
I think to add to that, we're going to show you just now how our local manufacturer has changed. But what you see here is an uptick in mining profits globally. You also see our business, if you take agri and mining, our business having more earnings and more diversification benefits coming from our mining business. So a global diversification, but also then a mining diversification, which means, you know, if you followed our company for 10 or 20 years and you think of us as a traditional fertilizer agriculture business that's linked or correlated directly to commodity prices, you're missing the great value and gem of a business. We are, which is what we're showing you is our ability to optimize between mining and agri and then have this much bigger international business which is adding diversification to our stock.
We can discuss this a little bit more further later where that is. If I missed a small slide, okay, there's a slide coming later. I will talk to a slide later that will back this one up a little bit further. Where that has landed us then is just to remind us of our disciplined capital allocation. You know, not much has changed on this slide, but we continue to manage capital very prudently. Our board has approved a capital framework and a capital management strategy to say that we will protect our core, we will grow our core. We've invested in a number of partnerships across the world and locally and we've put that capital in. So we must realize the value out of it. You see the value coming out of our Indonesian JV, you know, and our Canadian JV which has turned profitable.
And we will continue to grow our mining business and our agribusiness globally. So very disciplined, you know, we're not going to deviate too far from the core. Then, you know, a number of you have different views on this. So some of you love special dividends, some of you love share repurchases and some of you love something else. I don't know. But what we, what we said is, you know, we might not please all of you every year, but we will each year look at our cash generated. And if we take last year, you know, in position ZAR 1.8 billion and an ordinary dividend, we then did some share repurchases, we generated some cash circa ZAR 3 billion from our operations and then we invested in our business. And I think we, we want to highlight that, you know, we invested roughly ZAR 360 million in our existing operations.
We invested roughly ZAR 300 million in our, in our core RSA and international business businesses. And then we did two other investments which is our investment in Hypex Bio, which is ZAR 200 million 10% stake in the business, in this business in, in Sweden and then circa ZAR 175 million in our Canadian business. So ZAR 1 billion, you know, being invested in our business and thereafter we end up with this net cash position of ZAR 2.3 billion. The board met and I guess what we declaring today is an ordinary dividend in line with our policy and a special dividend of ZAR 3.25. I see a few lips moving so I'm beating the lips and not thinking what I should be saying. But thanks for that Craig. And what we do know is we have an incredibly strong balance sheet.
So we have, you know, we haven't used our debt and our debt facilities circa ZAR 4 billion. But I think the one thing I will promise you again is that we will not stretch our shoulders out and say that our balance sheet is strong and we've got a big war chest so we're out buying things. If you look back and you see what we've bought, we've invested in a very considered manner, we've invested in joint ventures, we've invested in partnerships and we've invested in businesses that we like to see profits in the short to near term. Indonesia is one of those and obviously Canada now profitable for the first time.
I'm going to hand over to Stephan and he's going to go into a little bit more detail from a financial perspective and then I'll come back to talk about our future story and our outlook. Thank you.
Thank you, Seelan. I think on that high note we can actually go to the exciting stuff which is the numbers. But first of all, good morning to all our board members, the shareholders and all the stakeholders and our staff all around the world. Before we jump into the numbers, maybe just a quick update on the SARS matter. Since half year, obviously the team has been engaging fully with SARS to find an amicable solution towards this. We're nearing the end of our ADR process and if we can't find amicable solution, the appeal process will then continue. But part of our core values is doing the right thing and we'll make sure we do the right thing for all stakeholders.
Maybe just then jumping into some of the numbers, specifically as Seelan mentioned, you can see the 16% decline in the revenues that was driven by the sharp decline in commodity prices. But if you take into account commodity prices has come down from the high of the last two years by close to 50%. In some cases that revenue drop from the commodity price was offset then by strong volumes in our agriculture SA business and across our mining business as well. From a gross profit margin point of view, just to remind our shareholders, in quarter four of last year there was a sharp decline in the commodity prices which really reduced the gross profit.
What you can see through this volatility now and the work that is done effectively from the cost savings initiatives and some optimization that we drive across our business, specifically in manufacturing supply chain has yielded a 21.8% gross margin for the period. From an expenses point of view, year-on-year our expenses was really well managed. Taking into account we operate in a high inflation environment and some of our bigger utilities, more specifically in our production facilities, the increases was significantly higher than the current inflation rate. That was offset then by the cost savings initiatives drive across the whole organization. Maybe just to highlight to our shareholders as well the share of net profit on investments, the equity one that is related.
The bulk of that is relating to our Indonesian JV which is starting to yield results as we continue seeding contracts into that JV. From a hyperinflation point of view, specifically in Zimbabwe, as we mentioned at half year, the functional currency in Zimbabwe has been changed from the first of April that made that hyperinflation a moot point into the current year. But from a Sierra Leone in the current environment moved into a hyperinflation economy. But what you can see, that's small in the bigger scheme of things. Maybe just also to highlight then from a net finance expense you will see the reduction from the comparative period and over the last couple of years we're continuously moving that down. That is driven by good cash focus, cash generation throughout the whole organization and good cash management as well.
That resulted then also from a tax point of view. You can see a decrease in our effective tax rate as highlighted to our shareholders in the prior year. Hyperinflation and the higher dividend tax with intercompany dividends in the prior period distorted the numbers, and the effective tax rate came down to 31.6%. That resulted then in profit for the year relative to the comparative period increased by 1%. And that actually underpins the strong financial position and the strong result delivered by the organization. If you take into account commodity prices in some cases, as we've already mentioned has came down by up to 50%. Maybe jump into some of the details, specifically in agriculture. So if we start off with Agriculture South Africa, you can see the downward pressure on revenue specifically due to the commodity prices.
But that was partially offset by the strong volume performance in Agriculture SA as well as also growth in our specialties business. Furthermore, there was strong support by our manufacturing and supply chain to enhance our margins further and to optimize across the organization and Seelan already touched on that, that further assisted us to actually grow our ammonia derivative sales out of Sasolburg. From an Agriculture International point of view, maybe if we look at the SADC business first across Africa there was significant challenge, macroeconomic challenges that the business faced as well as specific market dynamics that changes that played out in the Zambia environment.
If we look at the margins from an Africa point of view, we saw increased margins because some of that downward pressure due to the changes of the market dynamics were also partially mitigated by increased sales into the retail sectors as well as into our commercial businesses that resulted in the operating margins across those regions increasing from 6.7%-8.4%. If we look at our international business, that is our AgriBio business out of Australia, as we discussed with our shareholders earlier, that business specifically had two or three of their big customers face significant operational challenges to the first half of the financial year. Those challenges has been resolved in the second half and those volumes will then come through into the new year as well.
We continue to keep on investing in our international business to make sure we grow our distribution footprint on a global basis. During the year there was also additional mobilization costs into the U.S. to the amount of ZAR 20 million which we've disclosed in our documents. Maybe just specifically on Zimbabwe, we've added just additional disclosure on Zimbabwe from 2021 up to 2023. There was a lot of hyperinflation accounting which significantly distorted the numbers. During the current year hyperinflation was muted due to the change in the functional currency. But what you can see that the business faced significant headwinds and in the current environment, specifically in country there was downward pressures on volumes as well as the decline in commodity prices specifically in quarter one of the financial year put additional pressure on margins. We've also mentioned the constrained activity specifically in quarter four.
That's the ongoing dispute with Zimra and that resulted specifically in the tax clearing system, tax clearance certificate being delayed which constrained the trading in that environment. Maybe just if you look across our SADC region and across our agribusinesses, the management team is continuously focusing and reviewing the operating model taking into account the macro dynamics that the teams face. Then if I move us forward to our mining segment, this is really a good success story for our mining business. Specifically in South Africa. If you take into account mining production was fairly stable or declining in the South African environment. While our mining business managed to actually grow their volumes in the South African environment and furthermore enhanced their margins. From a revenue point of view, the downward pressure was due to the decline in ammonia prices.
The exciting part is the increase in operating profit of 12%. We can also see from a production and efficiency point of view in our mining business, we managed to invest more into collection and processing capabilities of used oil, which resulted in enhancing margins further in the uptake in our emulsions.
From an international point of view, over the last couple of years, as we've shown our shareholders, we're continuously investing into our international operations and those mobilizations cost over the last couple of years has created a bit of a drag on our operating margins as we actually now start to ramp up volumes in Canada as well as rolling in the contracts into our Indonesia JV, you can see that is actually suddenly resulting in that operating margin moving to the ranges where we expand, expected to be also in West Africa as well as into the SADC region. We've also seen growth in volumes in our mining business.
And then maybe lastly to touch on mining chemicals, our mining chemicals business over the last two years has delivered a solid performance with higher margins coming through the international segment and maybe just on the chemicals one to close off on the segment. The chemicals one was a disappointing performance for Omnia over the year. You can see the downward pressure on revenue and operating profits and that was driven in the face of the macroeconomic challenges that the business face. More specifically in the chemical sector as well as in the manufacturing sector, we've also seen lower consumer spending and also the infrastructure challenges mostly affecting smaller businesses due to ports, roads, rails as well as supply of electricity. But the management team remain focused to setting up the business for sustainable profitability going forward and also how to further simplify the operations.
Just if we can touch on the margins, we showed this slide to our shareholders over the last two results presentations and that was maybe just to show a bit of a scorecard on the delivery. We set ourselves targets due to the declining commodity price environment that we were facing and I'm pleased to announce that we actually exceeded our targets. A lot of those initiatives came across the businesses, but two most notably to note is specifically our manufacturing and supply chain which yielded good results also in line with the ESG targets and a lot of those benefits then comes through the operating cost line, but it also influenced the increase in the gross profit line as highlighted a bit earlier.
From a growth perspective, we spoke about the growth in our mining international business which we can see in Canada, India, Australia is basically next on the list for the mining business. I just want to remind our shareholders we're continuing investing into that international business from an agribio perspective. As we mentioned, some of the challenges faced which resulted in growth during the year but below our targets and we keep on focusing on that business going forward to make sure we enhance our returns. If you take into account that our agri international business margins is north of 20%-25% and then maybe just specifically on the targeted ranges, as Seelan touched on a bit earlier, we remain committed to our targeted ranges going forward.
I just want to remind our shareholders when we set out our initial targets in 2022, we actually revised or calibrated those targets upwards and we remain committed to those targets going forward. Maybe just if you think about the implications, the group is actually coming into the low end of our target ranges that we set out taking into account it's a low commodity price environment relative to what we've seen over the last couple of years and that talks to the heart of the diversification of our business strategy across the organization. That is not just between the mining and the agriculture business.
That's also between South Africa, SADC, and on the international basis. On the agriculture side, you will see we're just below our guidance ranges, and this is mostly due to some of the challenges faced across our SADC region or our African context within agriculture, as we also invested more into distribution into our AgriBio business or international business as we're starting to get traction in those distributions, which is much higher margin business. We expect our agriculture business to move into our guidance ranges. From a mining point of view, our mining is sitting at the top end of our mining ranges that we set out initially, and that's due to the growth coming out of our international business.
I just want to remind our shareholders we will continuously invest into Australia and those mobilization costs normally takes a year or two to make sure then you actually start enhancing your margins as we invest into that business. The chemicals business as we mentioned, it is a disappointing performance where our chemicals business ended the year. We still remain committed to our margin guidance and we've got focused teams on it to make sure we return to profitability in that business. If I then can just step forward into our financial position or the balance sheet. You'll see our assets for the year increased by 4% relative to the prior year.
That was mostly driven by the strong cash position as well as Stephan already touched on the two investments specifically in Indonesia, the Umongo JV as well as the Hypex Bio investment. We can see lower revenue and that's driven by our manufacturing and supply chain team to manage effectively not just price risk associated with this volatile environment, but also cash generation effectively. That's our working capital that the team managed quite closely. Intangible assets reduced year-on-year. And that resulted due to the amortization of a phased out ERP system that has reduced intangible assets. Then if we look at the liabilities, liabilities increased by 2% relative to the comparative period. And that was driven also by our supply chain finance, which you can see is coming through our payables number. Our equity increased by 6% relative to the comparative period.
That was slightly offset by the share repurchase as well as by the ordinary dividend. But you can see there's a strong generation of earnings coming through the organization. I'm not going to touch on the working capital, Seelan already mentioned that. But that resulted in a strong cash position of ZAR 2.3 billion relative to ZAR 1.8 billion in the prior period. And maybe just to close out from a cash flow point of view, if you look at the operating cash flows, first of all a really solid and strong performance by all the teams generating just north of ZAR 3 billion coming out of operating earnings. You can see as already highlighted in the working capital, there was a release of ZAR 600 million as there was commodity prices were coming down. There was also further driven the finance net finance expenses.
We keep on driving that down as we manage cash more effectively across the organization as well. Then from an investing point of view, as Seelan mentioned, we're sitting on $2.3 billion worth of net cash. But during the year we further invested just north of ZAR 1 billion into the organization, which was ZAR 679 million into our core operations for expansion, for maintenance as well as our ESG targets. And then we also did the further investment into the mining space Hypex Bio as well as into Indonesia JV as well from a cash distribution point of view relative to the prior year, relative in the prior year we paid an ordinary and a special dividend which in the current cash flows in the current year was only the ZAR 629 million ordinary dividend.
That all resulted in a strong performance and an increase of just over ZAR 600 million in cash and cash equivalents across the organization, a really solid performance that resulted. Then basically, as we put forward forward, a shareholder distribution that we've communicated to the market of ZAR 1.2 billion in the form of an ordinary and a special dividend as well. As we will continue with this share buyback process in a disciplined manner going forward. I would maybe just want to thank the Board, the Audit and Risk Committee, our auditors, and the finance and management teams that work really hard behind the scenes in order to get us in this position. Thank you.
Thanks. Thank you, Stephan. And I agree with that sentiment of thanking the various people who've worked tirelessly to get us to this point. There are two pieces of information that I just want to close off on and that is where will our future growth come from? And then a few slides on our outlook. So if I press ahead in terms of growth, we believe there's still solid growth in our business that we will continue to deliver against and that will come from our core SADC business optimizing our supply chain further, managing costs, increasing our volumes and also enhancing our inputs into the ESG space. I think there's still a lot more we can do there. We also know that we've got two fantastic value propositions for customers globally, the first being our Agri Bio business.
And I've said already that, you know, that business has incredible GP and OP margins, which Stephan has mentioned, and that business has still got distribution costs in it and has got an immense amount of value that we can still unlock. The team has been focused on growing distribution, building partnerships globally, and we will continue to invest and grow that business globally. I think the third part of our growth story is one that you can see significant benefits coming through already, and that's our mining business. So there's a few things there. You know, we will continue to unlock the value in the capital we've invested already, and that's Canada, Indonesia, and Australia. We will continue to take our Hypex Bio business globally and distribute their product into the markets that we intend to test and build plants with them to do that.
And I think thirdly, what we're seeing is with these partnerships and the great value proposition that BME has, there's opportunities to do more with partners in certain countries and territories that we believe this business can add value. I've already spoken about our mining chemicals business. It's well positioned for the uptick in some of the uranium mines in Namibia. It's well positioned for some of the mineral extraction that we see happening in West Africa. And added to that, in future years, we'd like to take it alongside BME into some of the countries that BME is in already and going into unlocking further value from the core. We mentioned that we've invested heavily in our supply and manufacturing capability. You see that wireless. We have increased our fertilizer volumes in RSA. You know, we've also increased our mining production and mining volumes.
We've been able to do that by optimizing what we make versus what we buy and optimizing when we make and when we buy to manage our business against commodity changes and customer buying behavior. So we will continue to invest in this chain that we've shown you. You see that the last one on there is the third party ammonia derivatives, which we've shown how we've grown that business. But we also believe there's opportunities for us to do more from a wholesale perspective and optimize our plants further. We've arguably got the strongest supply chain.
We know we've got the most modern plants, we've got some of the highest capacities and in terms of our sources, in terms of redundancy to being attached to the large provider of ammonia locally, we know that we can get ammonia locally, but we also can source ammonia on a global basis. And we've been able to do that very, very successfully over the last few years. Our team also keeps a close eye on all the green ammonia projects in SADC and a head of manufacturing monitors those. And when the opportunity arises for offtake or those plants become feasible, you know, we will ensure that we will benefit from, from that at the right price, of course. We then went one step deeper into our plants. So here we're talking to you about the entire ammonia chain.
There are other chains, but this is the chain our shareholders have often been concerned about. This is the chain that has the dependency on the very large provider of ammonia locally. So we've shown you how we've managed that. But then we went a little bit further and said, let's just talk for the first time about our current plants that are in Sasolburg. There are obviously other plants, they're liquid plants that are across the country, the BME detonator plants, emulsion plants that are in SADC and across the world. And there's our Humates plant in Australia. We haven't spoken about those. Now we're just speaking about our Sasolburg complex. And we're showing you here that what capacities we still have in our plant. So there's opportunities to ramp our plants up a little bit more.
We didn't want to give you exact capacity, so we put a dotted line there and we said, you know, you can just have a view of it. But then, you know, we started saying, let's go a step further and show you how much of each plant we used for mining versus agriculture. You know, now, you know, you might, we didn't do it in, you know, it's pretty scientific, but I think the picture it's showing you is that a large chunk of this complex is used for the mining sector. The picture it's showing you is that there's still capacities that we can unlock. And I guess if we go back to the previous chart, a big uptick is the third party ammonia derivative sales into the mining sector. The last block at the bottom.
It will be great if in future years we start showing you that block into agri, into the agri sector and maybe into some other sectors where we believe we can add some value so there's still value to be unlocked in our complex. I think what it shows you is how we've shifted our business more to a mining focus. It mitigates some of the cyclicality risks in agriculture. It also shows you how it changes our working capital patterns. It shows you how we then can optimize to buy in fertilizer and sell it rather than just manufacture. And it limits or it helps us manage our risk. In terms of El Niño and others, we still believe there's growth in SADC. So you know, a lot of what I talk about is our growth globally.
But in SADC, our BME business has shown an immense amount of growth. You know, you see our business win customer contracts continuously. And we believe there's growth in the agri market while as the agri sector itself hasn't grown over the last number of years, Omnia itself can grow in that sector by leveraging our brand strength, our agronomy skills, you know, which is, which underpins the Nutriology concept, which you've probably heard a few times actually, our AgTech skills, you know, you've seen us speak more and more about our ability to be precise and to be efficient with nutrient and water. So, likewise. There's opportunity to optimize our plant and do more. There is also opportunity for us to grow our customer base in both mining and agri in the southern African region. Just another minute or two on our AgriBio offering.
So we would have liked more volumes and more sales out of that, out of that area. So if there's an area we can do more. It's certainly this one. But our strategy to grow in that business hasn't changed. The moat in that business hasn't changed. And what we're also showing you at the bottom right, we don't, we're showing you that our OP margins and the ability to generate exceed extremely high OPs. There hasn't changed in that business. So we continue to invest in it. We continue to look for these wholesale distribution partners like Yara in Brazil, Deepak in India and you know, another large fertilizer company in China that we now getting chunks of volumes from. We will continue to do that from a B2B perspective across the world. And we are still very confident of the value that can be generated here.
What we can see is it's very difficult to grow alone. So having stronger partners and having partners that are growing themselves enhances the value we can get out of this asset going forward. This is a slide on our AgTech offering. So if I just talk through that a little bit, this is an offering that is predominantly in South Africa and SADC. Firstly, there are opportunities for us to take this offering into certain niche markets. You know, probably you'd say Brazil and Australia and maybe India where we've got a very strong partnership now. So we are looking at that and we are seeing how we can monetize this a little bit further. But locally there's still a lot of road left for us to build on this offering and enhance this offering for the agriculture community.
You would have, if any of you saw any of our media statements around Nampo, you've been seeing that we've been bringing in a chunk of robotics into this area. We've got a lot of sensing technology, a lot of AI technology that can predict the quality of crops. So you know, we, I think I've said before, we can accurately predict the crunchiness of an apple from the sap of an apple tree's leaf. And we continue to enhance that. We also help farmers to not over irrigate. So we've got sensors in the land to use the right amount of water. You know, we can also be very precise around spraying so there isn't waste of chemicals and fertilizer when spraying is happening. I think it's a fascinating space. We also have self drive tractors. Any of you know Elon Musk?
Well, you can tell him that if he wants the tech to have a self drive tractor next to its truck, his truck, we have that as well. So I think there's still a chunk of legs. Here we've put some resources behind it and we're exploring and talking to tech companies, to data companies and to partners locally and globally to see how we can do more with what we've got and how we can monetize this further. Then from a mining perspective. Now obviously here there's a lot happening and maybe I just want to slow it down and talk through each one a little bit. So in Canada we've invested some money and we've put our business and the MNK mining business together and we've seeded some contracts into that JV and Stephan has already told you that JV is equity accounted on the income statement.
So you see it there. What we do know is there's still a chunk of coal contracts that are still left that need to go into that, into that JV. So those contracts will continue over the coming years and that there will be some uptick there. What we know is Indonesia is a good mining market for us, so there are opportunities to grow. JV has won some new contracts so we will continue to invest in that, in that business and that business is slightly ahead of its business case. There are some opportunities to widen that a little bit in that area with our partner but we will trade very cautiously there and get the growth we want from the money we've invested initially. So I think I'm quite comfortable that that one has the trajectory to do what we needed to do in Canada.
So in Canada as well, we've got a very strong partner. We've got our mine site that we're blasting on and we've got our production facilities. That area has turned from a loss to a small profit in the current period. So the upside is still to come there. What you're seeing is us just broadly covering our costs and making, making some money. I'm very, very confident and comfortable with the progress being made there. I think it puts us in a good position to secure more customers and to do more with our partner there in that region and in other areas that are closely aligned to the Canadian market. Then in Australia, as Stephan has said, we've invested in infrastructure, people and plant in Australia and that business is not profitable yet. So what you're seeing is the setup costs in our numbers.
So as soon as that business turns to profitability or break even or beyond, you will have another uptick in the mining segment performance. We're exploring opportunities to partner with Folk and we've looked at a few over the years and we will hopefully find the right partner at the right time and execute on something in that area. To add to that, there's certain expansion in West Africa. So in the current period BME has turned some of its loss-making businesses around into profit, manage its cost well. So we've seen some value coming out of SADC and West Africa. I think what we're also seeing is the BME value proposition is able to secure new customers in regions that we're not in.
So in those circumstances we explore the opportunity to find partners in those regions and actually do potential ventures there that allow our BME business to make a difference in those mining markets. We spoke a bit about Hypex Bio. So in Hypex Bio there are two things. There's an equity investment and put that on the side and then there's a distribution agreement where we take their capability and we distribute it onto various countries and continents across the world. And BME will continue to work with them to distribute their product, to test their product, to help them build production facilities. And you know, these are very small mobile plants that get built in Sweden and get placed somewhere. So we intend having one or there is one currently being built that will be placed in Canada.
And we see the real value these plants and this product adds to mines in terms of an ESG and a safety perspective. And a number of the mines in Europe are prepared to pay premiums to have this product available to them. And obviously we state here that there's a number of trials ongoing where we testing the product together with Hypex. Finally then in the mining sector it's the growth that we will unpack from the mining, chemicals, space and as I said, some of that we can already point to. Those contracts have been signed and secured but some of it we also need to germinate and explore and see how that business can strengthen its muscle to actually go with BME into certain territories. Just talking about the tech, so I spoke about the tech of Agri, the tech of BME similarly incredible.
You know, I was so pleased the other day when I saw a post from a customer, I think it was of BME explaining how BME actually helped him solve a real mining problem and enhance their fragmentation and do a different blast. And they were thanking BME for that. And it over and over it reinforces the real value we add to our customers in mining and our customers in agriculture. The Hypex Bio investment, we've now touched on it. Ditebogo spoke about it, Stephan spoke about it and I've spoken about it. But I think maybe just to summarize, there's the equity investment circa ZAR 200 million. It's an incredible ESG offering and proven tested. They are blasting on the Boliden mines in Europe.
You can look at that on the website and see the middle picture is a tunnel that they're doing and obviously they commercially viable already.
So customers are buying their product and they're delivering the product on these Boliden mines. So there's a lot of interest. We presented a paper with them at the International Society of Explosives Engineers. I don't know why they complicated that much around this product. And it was an incredible amount of interest, I think interest in the product but also a lot of fear from traditional providers in how would this product disrupt traditional ways of blasting the mining chemicals. You know, we will continue to build out this business and build out the opportunities we see here. I've touched on it a few times. We've got a great team. We now have them working hand in glove with BME which will allow them to leverage BME's customer relations, geographical expansion and knowledge. And we think there will be value and growth unlocked from this as well.
In terms of outlook, just to move straight to there, and then we can move to quick questions. You know, we obviously positively disposed to population growth, food security, the energy transition. And this is underpinned by a very strong ESG initiative in our business. We focus on being purpose driven. So what we do, you know, we focus on doing what's right. We have a big focus on innovation and technology to be precise, precise in water, precise in nutrient, precise in blasting. And all of our technologies, whether it's the Humates business or our BlastMap , it's based on science, you know, so we can show the trials and the delivery and the impact we make. And we will continue to do that. We committed that all that we do will be focused and underpinned by shareholder value.
You know, we can choose which slide I speak to here. But you know, maybe the first one is telling you that, you know, we've said before that we will manage our cash prudently and we've demonstrated how we've gone from, you know, the debt positions to the cash positions. And I'm sure someone's going to say but why aren't you borrowing ZAR 1 billion or ZAR 2 billion? ZAR 2 billion with the debt and taking more risk. And we can answer that later. But what we've also focused on is the free cash flow. You know, make sure that when we need to invest money into our working capital and when the money must come out, it must come out, you know, it mustn't be stuck there. And obviously there I said, there's an area where we could have done a bit better in our SADC agribusiness.
And then finally, you know, at every year and every cycle, Stephan and I and the board, you know, tell you what we're doing from a dividend, a share buyback and a special dividend. I think yet again you'll see that we make disciplined, consistent decisions and, you know, we are distributing an ordinary special, you know, and continuing our buyback and being very prudent about what we invest in our business, so keeping enough back to invest in our business. I'm sure everyone will have a view of whether we could have done that slightly differently. But, you know, over the period, hopefully what you're seeing is the consistency of what we saying we do. There's obviously still significant potential and we're focusing on the customer, making sure we deliver that value to the customer. That value is underpinned by strong ESG solutions.
There's a chunk of work our manufacturing, our operations team can still do to enhance the cost efficiencies, the value we generate and optimize our plants further. I think what you're seeing is massive diversification and change that we've been able to bring in between agri and mining and also between local and global. We go about doing that in a very considered way from an M&A perspective. You know, we haven't gone out and just bought something without partners and whenever we've bought, we've had a very clear returns hat on and to make sure that it's value accretive for our shareholders. We operate in primary sectors. We have a focused business model underpinned by geographical diversification in our core markets, two markets of agri and mining.
There's still a lot we can unlock in terms of the capital we've already invested and our manufacturing supply chain excellence. There's some great distinct competitive advantages that we've got that will stand us in good stead going forward that we'll continue to invest in from an R&D perspective. And finally, the drum we've been banging over and over is the capital allocation drum. So, you know, to know when we need to put money in, to know where we put the money and also to know when we will take money out. And, you know, you've seen us do that and you've seen us also point to areas where potentially, you know, we will take capital out when the time is right. So I think broadly, that's our story. A bit of a mouthful and thanks for listening and we'll open up to questions. Louise, thanks.
Thank you, Seelan. I think we can take questions from the floor first.
Rowan.
Thank you. It's Rowan Goeller from Chronux Research. You gave a very detailed presentation. Thanks very much.
Just a few details I'd like to ask on.
On Australia, the mining business, what assets?
Are you specifically looking to invest in and what sort of CapEx would that require?
How long do you think it would be before you see some form of return?
Just as a first question.
Then secondly, ammonia security of supply with your major supplier going through its own challenges. Can you just talk through maybe some scenario planning on security of an ammonia supply going forward you can import? Yes, but are you comfortable that there's no real risk on future ammonia supply?
Thanks, Rowan. So if I go to the first question on the BME business in Australia, we've already invested in plant and capacity and capability there. So we've got that and we're doing trials and we've got some customers. That business as it stands in itself, you know, has to go somewhere. I think what we've been looking for, as in, a partner or an investment. A few years ago, we looked at an accessories business that was on the market there and we thought that was quite interesting as a complementary business to our explosives and blasting business. However, we didn't agree on price so we didn't go forward with it. And in Canada, what we have is a partnership with a blasting company and that is something that has worked well for us.
So, you know, if we were to dream for a minute and say, and I guess, you know, we don't want to be standing here and putting out something to say, we're looking for those three things because then those three things, asset prices start going up. So if you were to dream for a minute, you know, we will learn from our past and say, you know, what we've done in case Canada works well for us. And it makes sense if you're entering a new market to have a partner that has established relationships with customers and who is already on a mine. So those would make sense, you know, if I think of the amount of capital and the returns, you know, we've considered all of that in terms of our capital allocation.
So we believe the balance sheet has the capacity to do any of those things that are out there in the near term that we exploring. I'm being a little bit, I'm answering it in a little bit of an opaque fashion, but I hope you can will accept that in terms of the ammonia supply chain, we are concerned about the main supplier of ammonia in the country. And I think we are concerned that over the last 18-24 months there has been major supply chain disruption and downtimes. I'm looking for Jacques and downtimes is Jacques still here somewhere? And what we've been able to do is mitigate that with our imports and our rail tankers.
We believe that from importing of product and importing of ammonia, so the importing potentially of fertilizer and using all potentially more imported ammonia for explosives, you know, we will be able to manage our business prudently. I think it's important to say that that's not all we worried about. We also worried about the large supplier that is intertwined into the South African manufacturing sector. So there's other things that that supplier provides besides ammonia. And we have got a number of projects underway to think about that as well. You know, whether that is steam or gas or water or others. So we would love that supply to strengthen itself up and to be. And to deliver strong sustainable supply not only to us, but the entire sector.
So this is something we watch closely and we believe if we look back, we've had disruption and we've had ammonia shortages and we've been able to manage that quite well. Have I answered both questions here? Thank you.
Congratulations on the results from SPG Securities. I've just got three questions. Looking at earnings now, right? You've come up like basically at the same point as last year without like diving into the divisions and besides the chemicals, are we at a point where this is normalized earnings through the cycle or could you like just give a bit more color even at the divisional level? And also looking at the chemicals business, I see in the last interims there was a new executive for chemicals. Could you please give us an idea of what the plan is to going forward and if the current margins are still attainable or realistic. And lastly CapEx, just to understand maintenance CapEx at a plant level, I see there are some points where you haven't spent as much CapEx in previous years and sometimes carried forward.
So could you help us understand how you, how your maintenance is going? Because your peers have had to. Your large supplier, as you call them, has had a turnaround last year and another, another competitor of yours is. They have to maintain their plant. Just could you help us understand how to look at the CapEx too.
Thanks. I've got quite a few people here. Maybe I'll start with the earnings. I think, you know, whenever we put our results out like this, I think it's important to, to stay humble and recognize that there are areas where we could have done better, you know, so if I look at our earnings that we've printed today, there are areas where we could have printed more. The first one you pick up is really your second question, which is the chemicals business. You know, we would have liked, you know, probably ZAR 100-150 million of earnings from the chemicals business. You know, that's what, you know, that's what, what we would see as normalized. The second area where we could have done more is in our SADC agriculture business.
I think what I pointed to in the growth slides, a number of initiatives where we believe, you know, we can get additional growth from an earnings perspective in future years. I guess the question is, how much of that will we get this year, next year and the following year? And what I can assure you, our teams are focused on growing those earnings. So I would never say that this year was our best year in terms of earnings. You know, we've had some challenges, we've had some serious headwinds that we faced and the team faced that well. I think there are earnings that our current core business can just deliver an uptick on. Having said that, there's a chunk of earnings growth that will also come from new initiatives, and those new initiatives are Canada, which is, you know, just turned profitable now.
So we expect to see more from that. You know, the story of Indonesia and Australia and others. So I think if you think of our earnings, you know, I don't think, you know, this is our, the best earnings we've printed. I think this is very resilient earnings with a lot of headwinds. I think if some of those headwinds fade, if Protea starts doing what we wanted to do, if our SADC business starts doing what we wanted to do, and a few of the optimizing and growth initiatives come through, you will see an uptick of earnings in the future years from a chemicals perspective. Our very astute executive you're talking about is sitting right here, but I'm not going to ask him to speak and put him on the hotspot. But I think what we always said is our chemicals business is less core.
So, you know, our focus is on mining and agriculture. You know, should the chemicals business have a partner that is better suited than us to be involved with it. We will consider that at the right time and at the right stage when that makes sense. And what we've done in terms of a detailed action plan, we've enhanced our executives in that business. From a sales perspective, Andre Harding, who is the executive you're talking about, he's done an incredible job to link us back to our principals, so the folk to the suppliers that supply us the molecules and then linking that to the customers. I think what we can see is the downturn in the customer base, the manufacturing sector in South Africa has really resulted in the business having the performance it has.
You know, the business still has its competitive advantage, but this bottom has just fallen out of the sector. So what he is doing now is he's optimizing the business from a cost perspective, from a logistics perspective. If the volumes come out, come down, you'll know that the tablecloth is far too big for the table. So we've been exiting some of our warehouses, some of our infrastructure assets and others. What we will do is reunite the business with certain principals and certain customers. By principals, I mean suppliers or, you know, those that provide certain types of chemicals to the customer. We will think further about a partner, a distribution partner. We will think further about a principal partner in that business in terms of margins. You know, see the front slide around the margin guidance. I think chemicals is small.
So we didn't. We don't want to change the margin guidance. You know, when BME was missing its margin guidance for the few years, for the last few years or whatever, we didn't change the margin guidance. In fact, we upped the margin guidance because you got a point to where it should be. You know, you can't settle to it where it's at. So I think for us, any chemical business, and actually this was something Andre and us spoke about in preparing for the results yesterday. You know, we said, someone's going to ask us, should we not reduce the margin guidance? And Andre said, no, that's where that business should perform. We will get it back. You know, we will get it back there. So we're not changing the margin guidance on chemicals.
I think we will continue to explore all the options available to us to get that business back to where it should be in terms of capital. You know, I think, I think it's somewhere between Stephan , Glen and Francois that maybe wants to answer that a little bit. Give me a break.
I'm not sure if this one is on. Yeah, I think from a capital, you will see we didn't include it in the main deck. There is a disclosures on slide 64 that's in the appendix where we give a view on the capital as well and what you will see from a maintenance point of view. We continuously do the maintenance required across our facilities. You know, that will ebb and flow depending on year. There's certain years where there's high maintenance required but that's in the range of the ZAR 250 million marks. So we continuously doing that and as we maybe just maybe put it out in the past as well, we've got younger plants because you make reference to maybe our competitors or some of the other folks in the market.
So you know, so I assume, you know, I can't look into where they are, but we maintain our plants. You will see we spend a bit more on ESG and the expansion part but that's specifically in growing the core. And you will see that guidance will still hold water going forward as well. So we continue doing the maintenance required and we actually expanding in some cases in the core with additional storage and others that is required at our Sasolburg facilities.
Yeah, thanks Stephan. I think we'll in the back, we talk, we will have a slide around the guidance around CapEx. But I think the one point Stephan makes is we do have the newest, most modern plants. We do have the highest capacity. Francois will say we've got the best chief engineer on our management team here. But we've got, we've been investing in like the EnviNOx technology years ago. So you know, when you look and compare everybody, you know, maybe just think one, what are we spending the CapEx on? You know, so we've. And we're spending CapEx on different things. So you know, I can tell you that we do not skimp on CapEx. And you are correct.
There are times when we, you know, when we, in terms of reliability and optimizing, you know, we have the flexibility to move a shut to a different date if it makes sense and produce product. In other instances, you know, we might decide to have a shut now because of these market conditions and actually enhance the reliability of our plants later. So we've never shown you this but you know, we have a dashboard that we can show you each year when we have our shuts, you know, what those shuts cost and what they mean for our production efficiencies and recoveries. We also able to optimize those shuts based on preventative maintenance, reliability and market demand. The team have been doing an incredible job to do that over the years.
Our shuts are not, you know, if you go back 10 years, our v were at certain points in the year all the time. We've now been, you know, we've now got to such an advanced level in terms of what we do. We're able to move them a little bit to cater and optimize for demand and when production is needed. I'm hoping we answered okay there. I think the one thing is just to be, I think the CapEx slide, we didn't go through it here. We must just check that there is in the annex. It is there, that 60s slide. Okay. Any other questions?
We have some questions on the webcast. Seelan, you've already touched a bit on the chemicals division margins, but. There was a specific question from Warren Riley of Bateleur Capital . He says the chemicals division generated a 0.5% operating margin. What would be a good outcome in the year ahead?
Yeah, so I mean the chemicals business, I don't think we can look at the operating margin and judge from that because you know, when your operating leverage goes against you, your margin just falls out. I think the main lead indicators for how the business will perform will be how the management team reorganize and restructure the business to make it more sustainable in a different economic environment. And it will be underpinned by how the manufacturing sector picks up. I think what we can see is there's still a lot of uncertainty around that in the markets it operates. You know, I would say on a normalized basis, and I know your question is referring to this current year, but on a normalized basis, not this current year.
You know, I would say this business should give us between ZAR 150 million and ZAR 200 million. So that's where we pointing to. And you know, don't criticize me for pointing to where we should be and not worrying too much about where we are because we have to get there. And I think in the short term we don't mind how that business performs in the short term, provided the management team is putting us in the long term and medium term to get to where it should be. And that's what we focused on. So if we take pain in the short term, we don't mind that to ensure that we get significant gain in the medium to long term.
Thank you, Seelan. The next question is from Adam Nkambule from Allocated Capital. What is the strategic imperative towards retaining the business in Zimbabwe, especially with regulatory and hyperinflation challenges that persist there.
So I guess Zimbabwe has been a challenge for most corporates that have been in the country. You know, we've gone through hyperinflation. We've gone through a very difficult, difficult macro condition. I think what Stephan and I have said previously, Zimbabwe is a market that's very close to us where we can provide significant benefit from an agri and a mining perspective. You know, we have, we are reviewing our operating model in Zimbabwe and in a number of other SADC countries, which you've got to do continuously because things are changing so fast. You know, I think for us, we, we would like to have an offtake of our product in Zimbabwe. But what we can see, it's a very difficult operating environment to be there alone.
So, you know, I'll leave it there and at the right time, you know, when we have a view of how we can progress forward, you know, we will announce that. But Zimbabwe is a, it is a headache for me. I'd be, I'd have a big smile on my face. That's not genuine if I told you it's not a headache.
Thank you. Seelan. The last question from the webcast for now is from Warren Riley of Bateleur Capital . Could you provide an idea of current losses being made in Australia? What is capacity utilization across the manufacturing assets and where is the most upside potential?
Okay, so in Australia we've got two businesses. We've got the AgriBio business and obviously that is profitable, very cash generative and that has got broadly about 50% capacity that's installed already and we just have to distribute that. I guess if you're talking about the mining business, we are making, we have got setup costs there that's resulting in that, in that business making a loss. And we haven't, we haven't disclosed that publicly. I think what I can say is that's in the mining segment number, you know, but if you, you know, if you think that at some point that will come out and that will be profit, it would be a nice, you know, a nice level of upside for that business.
Yeah, I think we, you know, maybe at a later stage we can think about more detailed disclosure, but I don't think we want. We've separated that business out separately.
Thank you, Seelan. Are there any other questions from the floor?
Okay, so thank you to all of you online. I know there was at some point almost 130 people online. Thanks for joining online and we appreciate your time. We appreciate all of you coming here and I think we do have a cup of coffee and a snack for all of you if you would like to join us again. Thank you to our shareholders, our banks, our stakeholders, our board and our management team for allowing us to deliver a set of results that I think can make us all proud. Thank you very much.