The negative consequences of the pandemic are being felt especially this year at the dredging and construction company Jan De Nul. But the customers are already coming back, says CEO Jan Pieter De Nul. The biggest challenge now is finding staff in a country that is not tackling unemployment.
The turnover of the dredging and construction group Jan De Nul decreased by 5 percent in 2020 to 1.9 billion euros. That is less than the decline in turnover of its competitor DEME (-18% to 2.2 billion euros). Nevertheless, CEO Jan Pieter De Nul remains cautious. “We are again heading for stricter health measures. But strangely enough, this seems to affect our customers relatively little. They are now making the decisions they had postponed for a year and a half. It seems as if they are learning to live with the virus.”
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The turnover of the dredging and construction group Jan De Nul decreased by 5 percent in 2020 to 1.9 billion euros. That is less than the decline in turnover of its competitor DEME (-18% to 2.2 billion euros). Nevertheless, CEO Jan Pieter De Nul remains cautious. “We are again heading for stricter health measures. But strangely enough, this seems to affect our customers relatively little. They are now making the decisions they had postponed for a year and a half. It seems as if they are learning to live with the virus.” JAN PIETER DE ZERO. “The figures give a distorted picture. The effect of a crisis only slowly seeps through to us, because existing contracts support turnover for a relatively long time. Due to the crisis, our customers did not place any new orders. This has had a huge impact on the figures this year. Returns also suffered. In 2020, the yards remained closed for a week before and after the Easter holidays, with a rather limited effect. The measures after the lockdown were more drastic. The crew of our ships did not get home or had to be quarantined for them The rules also changed continuously per country, which was disastrous for the planning, read: the margins. “It was also a catastrophe for our investments of 620 million euros in the construction of new ships in China. Our Belgian employees at the shipyards were sent back straight away because they had not been vaccinated with the local vaccine. As a result, the ships will not be able to be deployed until early 2022. We also have to postpone planned works for a year. That will also affect the result. It’s too early to quantify that. We were also not prepared for this crisis. No one had a plan for a pandemic.” THE ZERO. (ironically) “Very straightforward. At first, mouth masks were not necessary. Then they became obligated. And when it was no longer necessary, you saw the politicians appear on TV with masks. The experts were politically steered, I think. We have no fewer than eight ministers in Belgium who are responsible for health. Belgium, with its 64 ministers, is completely ungovernable. Name me one who can call himself a statesman. I don’t know any. They have to tackle the national debt, but they are happy to hide behind the fight against covid. The bill will come one day.” THE ZERO. “An unexpected side effect is the increased global understanding that an energy transition is needed to combat climate change. This change in mentality is not a result of the climate demonstrations of truant students. There is a growing awareness that we are going to drive electrically and build wind turbines. But meanwhile, China is building new coal-fired power stations and increasing its fossil steel production. While Western industry invests in climate action and drives up costs, Chinese competition can keep prices down. We have to react to that or our industry will suffer badly. But I believe that in time we will also get China along.” THE ZERO. “Electric networks are being optimized at an unprecedented rate. The big problem is the peaks in demand, which differ from country to country. Connecting networks together makes them function better. Suddenly we can no longer meet the demand for our three cable layers. Power stations are being built in Papua New Guinea to connect with Australia. Solar panels are being planned in the Sahara to supply Europe with energy. Evolution is moving at lightning speed. “Anyone who had said ten years ago that these kinds of decisions would be politically supported and technically possible, was considered crazy. Those kinds of measures were also unaffordable at the time. However, the price of the production of sustainable and fossil energy is growing towards each other. electricity bill, the more will be invested in sustainable solutions, such as energy saving, energy optimization and CO2-neutral production, but it will still cost money.” THE ZERO. “The price will be passed on in the production of raw materials, goods, services and food products. The consumer will pay the price of the fight against global warming. You, in other words.” THE ZERO. “Our country has missed a lot of opportunities. With the SCK in Mol, we were at the top worldwide in nuclear knowledge. We had everything in-house to help develop the small nuclear power stations that are now the spearhead in France as an alternative to fossil energy supply. What are we doing? THE ZERO. “Climate change is leading to heavier sea storms, also in the North Sea. The Netherlands is strengthening its dykes and France is doing that in the north. Unfortunately, Flanders is lagging behind. If the water rises, it will find a way.” THE ZERO. “The share of environmentally-related activities, such as the construction of wind turbines and sustainable coastal protection, is much larger. Those 2 percent are only the remediation, and they will increase. The remediation of brownfields is becoming profitable in many places, because the price of the Until today, an 80-hectare site is available in Brussels, the Schaerbeek marshalling yard, but the remediation has not been carried out because it is too expensive. That could change. “Our environmental company Envisan is small, but you have to look at a broader context. It is a center of expertise that contributes to the functioning of the group. In this way we avoided delays in work earlier, because our environmental company was able to quickly submit solutions. For example, we have two physicochemical installations that can process 100,000 tons of contaminated soil into a concentrated matter per year. This activity can perfectly contribute to the smooth construction of the Oosterweel connection, for example.” DE NUL. “Some people think that the remediation will delay the works for two years. Unjustly. The ghost stories about PFOS will encourage action groups to delay the works. There are technical possibilities to tackle this pollution. The question is whether this is possible due to its size. PFOS is everywhere. Remediation of all fire stations contaminated with PFOS alone will take years. “Do you know nonylphenols? These substances are present in cleaning products and paint, and can cause breast cancer. Twenty years ago they were the subject of health studies. Until it turned out that there was no herb against it, but also that they could not be missed. nobody is talking about it anymore. The storm around PFOS will also blow over.” THE ZERO. “Certainly. Land has already been requisitioned to store the rubble and we have already carried out emergency works for bridges. The big problem is that a lot has to be done, but there is a lack of manpower. However, the region has many unemployed people. a reservoir of long-term sick people. The government now wants to shorten their benefits over time. By 2.5 percent! In this way we will not reach the employment rate of 80 percent, never by the way. Neither Brussels nor Wallonia want to participate in this. “Meanwhile, we can not fill vacancies. A few years ago I got a kick out of saying that half of Belgians don’t work because the government allows it. Nothing has changed in the meantime. On the contrary, the situation on the labor market is getting worse. Every employee in the private sector has to support almost two civil servants, unemployed, sick or retired. That is untenable.” THE ZERO. “If expertise is decisive, we can handle the competition. They push us to be more efficient. But the Chinese learn quickly. One day they will reach our level. They are under our price worldwide, because their shareholder – the state – considers the growth of the dredging industry more important than profit. We feel the Chinese competition as far as Hungary and Poland. I expect that they will also buy small dredgers in Europe to get a foot in the door. In the meantime, we have been banned from the Chinese market. “The United States also keeps us out through the Buy America First Act and the Jones Act. The Americans are putting pressure on their partners worldwide to trade with their companies, but at home they have their own vision of the free market.” THE ZERO. “We have the same expertise. In contrast to our competitors, however, we did not become big with acquisitions. When dredging companies merge, you bring old fleets together. We have grown under our own strength and had new ships built all the time. Our equipment is therefore more modern .” THE ZERO. “That would create a group that covers 40 percent of the dredging internal market. The competition authorities never allow that.” THE ZERO. “In retrospect, that complaint is a shame. DEME, like us, has strict anti-corruption rules. We were about to win a big contract, when people at DEME thought they were smarter. We were really done. DEME keeps us on our toes, and vice versa. Don’t underestimate the competition between the Dutch, by the way. Their companies are more chauvinistic than we are and keep it more diplomatic.” THE ZERO. “My son Pieter Jan is responsible for activities in South America and my daughter Julie is the CEO of Jan De Nul Dredging. I have full confidence in the next generation.” THE ZERO. “We have our holding company in Luxembourg. It is a small country, where things are approached very pragmatically. For example, the Luxembourg government has strongly supported us in the hijacking problem. And by the way: Luxembourg socialists are usually more right-wing than our liberals.”
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