BALCO'S hay processing plant at Balaklava that was gutted by fire early on Saturday morning is expected to take eight to 12 months to rebuild.
Chief executive officer Rob Lawson said the cause of the fire was not yet known.
Investigators were inspecting the plant to look into the cause on Tuesday morning.
Mr Lawson said the fire started at 2am on Saturday morning, three hours after Balco’s final shift of the day finished.
“We had a call from our monitoring system which notified us of the fire,” he said.
“Investigators are out looking into the cause of the fire but at this stage it is unlilkely to be determined.”
A large shed and two hay press machines were burnt extensively.
“At this stage we’re not sure if the machines are recoverable,” Mr Lawson said.
About 1000 tonnes of hay also went up in the blaze.
All up, the damage is estimated at between $11 to $14 million, which Mr Lawson said was covered under insurance.
Balco is working on ensuring staff remained employed.
“At the moment we’re working it through, to see if some local businesses can help to place some of our guys,” he said.
“Some of our competitors can utilise our staff and they can come back when we’re ready after the rebuilding process.
“Our aim is to keep everyone employed, we want to look after our staff as much as we can.”
While Mr Lawson said rebuilding the processing facility was likely to take eight to 12 months, Balco was looking at other options to get back to work sooner.
“It could be that we can use our other sheds,” he said.
“We still have three other sheds, which are all just used for storage usually, but that doesn’t mean it’s impossible for something else to go in.”
