South African flexible packaging manufacturer Pavati Plastics Southern Africa is advancing local production of cast polypropylene (CPP) films through a capital expansion programme centred on a five-layer COLINES cast-film extrusion line, supported by flexographic printing, lamination and slitting capabilities.
The investment forms part of Pavati’s move to establish domestic production of specialised polypropylene substrates that have historically been imported into South Africa. The programme was supported by a R50 million matching grant approved by South Africa’s Department of Trade, Industry and Competition (the dtic) under its Black Industrialists Scheme.
At the centre of the extrusion investment is a COLINES five-layer CPP cast-film line, which Pavati has been commissioning and optimising for commercial production. The company says the platform is being developed to manufacture CPP films with controlled sealing performance, roll quality, optical clarity and gloss, together with 40-dyne corona treatment for subsequent printing and lamination.
CPP is produced by extruding molten polypropylene through a flat die before rapidly cooling the polymer on chill rolls. A multilayer configuration allows different polypropylene formulations to be distributed across individual layers of the film structure, enabling the producer to engineer properties required for flexible packaging applications.
Pavati has previously reported producing 25-micron CPP on the COLINES five-layer line and subsequently laminating its own CPP-to-CPP structure. The company is also developing MOPP/CPP mono-material polypropylene structures, targeting moisture barrier, stiffness, printability, sealing performance and compatibility with high-speed converting. Its current development programme includes evaluation for snack packaging applications.
The extrusion capacity is integrated with downstream converting technology. SOMA has confirmed supplying Pavati with an eight-colour Optima² CI flexographic press, an S-Mount automatic plate mounter, Lamiflex E laminator and Pluto III slitter, creating capabilities extending from substrate production through printing, lamination and finishing.
Pavati has already demonstrated extended-colour-gamut printing on CPP produced on its COLINES line using the SOMA CI press. The company was recognised at the 2024 Black Industrialists Awards for work involving ECG printing on its internally extruded CPP substrate.
The manufacturing programme is based in Clayville, Gauteng, where Pavati operates its extrusion and flexible packaging converting activities.
“Between 2015 and 2021, Pavati Plastics evolved from a service business into manufacturing. We were building a black-managed, sustainable packaging entity with capabilities in extrusion, recycling and specialised manufacturing. By 2021, the business had moved into a capital expansion phase focused on import replacement,” said Ntombenhle Nhleko, Financial Director of Pavati Plastics.
According to the dtic, Pavati’s broader manufacturing capabilities now span extrusion, printing and bagging, with products including machine and manual pallet wrap, Zip Lock coin bags, CPP and monoaxially oriented polypropylene (MOPP).
The company says newer production equipment has also improved process efficiency and allows manufacturing offcuts to be returned to the production process, reducing material waste.
Pavati is positioning the polypropylene investment primarily as an import-replacement programme, intended to increase South Africa’s ability to manufacture specialised flexible packaging substrates domestically rather than source them from overseas.
The Black Industrialists Financing Forum Adjudication Committee approved a further 12-month extension of the BIS project in June 2025, taking the project period to 31 May 2026.
Pavati has subsequently continued commissioning and process optimisation of its five-layer CPP platform, with its focus moving towards repeatable commercial production of locally manufactured CPP films.
The available sources do not disclose the COLINES line’s installed output in kg/h or tonnes per annum, working width, maximum line speed, die width or total capital value allocated specifically to the extrusion equipment. The R50 million figure relates to the matching grant supporting Pavati’s wider capital expansion programme and should therefore not be presented as the purchase price of the COLINES line.