Embalming chemicals

       Embalming chemical is a highly-flammable compound containing formaldehyde, methanol, ethanol and other solvents.

Chemical industry is of substantial economic significance to the country, contributing around 5% to GDP and approximately 23% of its manufacturing sales. The industry is the largest of its kind in Africa.

 It is highly complex and widely diversified, with end products often being composed of a number of chemicals which have been combined in same way to provide the required properties and characteristics. It can be divided into four broad categories: 

Base chemicals
Intermediate chemicals
Chemical end-products
Specialty end-products

Base chemicals including the petrochemical building blocks, ethylene, propylene, butadiene, benzene, toluene, xylenes, and methanol, which are all important chemical building blocks sourced from the petrochemical industry. Inorganic chemicals such as ammonia, caustic soda, chlorine, Sulphur, soda ash, bromine, fluorine and phosphorus, to name but a few, are also base chemicals.

Intermediate chemicals is a term which can be used to describe a plethora of products such as ammonia, waxes, solvents, phenols, tars, plastics, and rubbers. 
Chemical end-products includes processible plastics, paints, explosives, and fertilizers. 

Specialty chemical end-products tend to be lower volume, higher added-value chemical products. Many pharmaceuticals, Angro-chemicals, bio-chemicals, food-, fuel- and plastics - additives fall into this category. 

The base, intermediate chemicals and chemical end products are produced by the larger companies such as Sasol, Omnia, African Explosives Ltd, AECI, Other players which are active in these categories include Hoechst SA, Afrox, Bayer, Shell Chemicals, BASF, Engen Petroleum, Silicas SA (Pty) Ltd, ICI, Rohm and Haas, Air Products. Traders and agents are also active in this market. 

There are a number of companies involved in local production or importation of specialty and performance chemicals. Included are AECI, Fine Chemicals Corp (S.A. Druggists), Henkel, Re-vertex, CH Chemicals and various companies in Protea Chemicals which is now part of the Omnia Group. There is an active trading sector comprising traders and agents who handle the importation and marketing of specialty and fine chemicals. Included are Protea Chemicals, Crest Chemicals & Walker, Lewis & Everett and T&C Chemicals.