Commodity supply chain specialists Drum Resources have split from their CIS/Russia involvement into a completely separate company.

The new organisation, headed by managing director Andrew Barr-Sim, is now focused solely on the management of supply chain and logistical operations in Africa.

Drum Resources’ European head office has moved from London to Frome, Somerset, England. Its African central hub remains in Durban, South Africa.

According to Barr-Sim, the decision to separate the African operations from the CIS/Russia company was as a result of sustained adverse financial conditions.

When Drum Resources was launched in 1997, it initially focused on the CIS/Russia region with small ad hoc African projects. Drum’s African operations were formally established in December 2005 with a sugar operation in Mali and this precipitated the establishment of the South African entity to market and manage Drum’s fast-expanding African operations. Since then, a further six subsidiaries have been set up to provide an operational footprint for Drum across Sub-Saharan Africa.

The CIS company is called Drum Risk Management and is headed by Peter Hopkins who also remains as the main shareholder.