Displaying items by tag: Production

China: Cement output in China increased by 7.4% year-on-year in 2012 to 2.18Bt, according to data released by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. Clinker output rose by 1% to 1.28Bt. Obsolete cement production capacity of 220Mt/yr was eliminated.

In other news the China Building Material Federation has released production information for regions in north-western China. Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region produced 41Mt of cement in 2012, a year-on-year increase of 32.8%. Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region saw cement output increase by 10% to 16.1Mt. Shaanxi Province saw cement output increase by 16.3% to 76Mt. Gansu Province saw cement output increase by 32% to 36.7Mt.

Production in 2012: China built 124 new dry-process cement production lines and added 160Mt of cement clinker production capacity in 2012, according to the China Cement association. China had 1637 dry-process cement production lines with a production capacity of 1.6Bnt/yr of clinker by the end of 2012.

Sichuan Province in south-western China has seen its cement output climb by 2.02% year-on-year to 130Mt in 2012, according to the local Statistics Bureau. In 2012, Sichuan's cement industry recorded US$7.68bn in total output value, a year-on-year increase of 1.87%. Meanwhile, the industry's profit rose by 0.81% year-on-year to US$0.44bn.

North China's Hebei Province's cement output reached 128.1Mt in 2012. The province's building materials industry recorded US$1.7bn in profit in 2012, a year-on-year decrease of 21.8%.

East China's Jiangxi Province saw its cement output increase by 10.2% to 76.4Mt in 2012, according to the local branch of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.

Sinoma: Sinoma International Engineering has announced that the company plans to invest US$25.2m to set up a subsidiary in Hong Kong. The Hong Kong unit will acquire a 68% stake in the India-based cement firm, LNV Technology. Sinoma International said that the acquisition will increase its competitiveness in India's cement engineering market.

Separately, Sinoma estimated that the company's net profit for 2012 will decrease by 50% year-on-year in 2012, compared with a profit of US$247m in 2011.

Company news: Shanghai-listed cement and clinker producer, Xishui Strong Year Co Ltd Inner Mongolia, has estimated that the company's net profit will surge by 590% on-year in 2012, compared with a profit of US$1.51m in 2011.

Fujian Cement Inc expects to earn US$4.17m to US$4.98m in net profit in 2012, a year-on-year decrease of 79.2% to 75.27%.

Henan Tongli Cement Co Ltd, a Shenzhen-listed cement producer, has estimated that its net profit for 2012 will be between US$23.9m and US$28.6m, a year-on-year decrease of 26.1% to 38.1%. Tongli Cement earned US$38.7m in net profit in 2011.

China: The Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in north west China produced 35.1Mt of cement in the first 10 months of 2012, a year-on-year increase of 24.8%, according to the local statistics bureau.

From 1 January 2012 to 31 October 2012, Xinjiang saw the output value of its cement industry output come to US$1.93bn, a year-on-year increase of 0.9%. However, the industry earned just US$170m in profit, a year-on-year decline of 58.6%.

The region's government says that the region's cement production capacity is likely to exceed 90Mt/yr in 2013.

Meanwhile, Japan's Taiheiyo Cement Corp. has announced that it has agreed with a Chinese chemical maker to set up a 1.2Mt/yr cement plant in Xinjiang. The joint venture, to be known as Xinjiang Tianye Taiheiyo Building Material Company, will start cement production in November 2014.

The new company will be owned 40% by Taiheiyo Cement (China) Investment Corp., a Beijing-based unit of Taiheiyo Cement and 60% by the Chinese partner, Xinjiang Tianye (Group) Co.

Iran: Iranian cement production surpassed 49.14Mt in the first eight months of the current Iranian calendar year which began on 20 March 2012. The figure is 6% higher than in the same period of 2011, according to the IRIB News Agency. Iran also exported over 9.38Mt of cement and clinker over the same period, a 30% increase compared to the same period of 2011.

Some 8.25Mt of cement and 1.14Mt of clinker were exported during the same period. Iraq, central Asian countries, the United Arab Emirates and Afghanistan were its main customers.

Iran's cement production capacity currently stands at 86Mt/yr, according to the Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. He said that the country currently produces some 76Mt/yr.

"Six year ago Iran was dependent on importing cement and nobody would believe that one day the country could become an exporter in the field. However, as we see today, Iran has become one of the world's greatest cement producers and exporters," said Ahmadinejad.

In August 2012 Iran's Industry, Mine and Trade Minister Mehdi Ghazanfari said that the country's cement production capacity would reach 110Mt/yr by 2015.

Middle East: Cement companies in the Middle East witnessed a 24.3% increase in revenues in the first quarter of 2012 to US$1.26bn as construction picked up in certain parts of the region.

The industry's profits rose to US$435.6m in the second quarter of the 2012 financial year, compared to US$359.5m in 2011, a growth of 21.2%. However, according to Global Investment House's report, net margins suffered a fall during the period.

UAE and Oman reported higher revenues due to the better operating environments in both countries. The sales revenue of UAE firms increased by 7.7% to US$258.1m, bringing gross margin back to double digits at 10.5%.

Rizwan Sajan, chairman of Danube Building Materials, said that the UAE construction industry had started to pick up. "The second quarter of this year was much better than the first quarter on positive signs in the UAE," Sajan said. Omani companies witnessed a 16.7% increase in revenue to US$100.3m.

Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia achieved strong growth of 34.7% in revenue during the quarter, outperforming the UAE, Qatar and Oman. Saudi Arabia is witnessing a significant rise in demand because of its development plan. In March 2011 King Abdullah Bin Abdul Aziz ordered the construction of 500,000 housing units, as well as the building and expansion of hospitals. He also ordered the injection of capital into specialised credit institutions to facilitate debt write-offs and increase mortgage lending.

It is expected that Saudi Arabia's cement demand will strengthen in 2013, with US$24bn of transport projects under way or in the pipeline. The Haramain High Speed Railway has taken centre stage, with the final contract for the project, worth US$1.4bn, awarded in July 2011. Attention should now turn to the US$7bn Saudi Landbridge project, an east-west rail line that will link Jeddah and Dammam.

Iran: Iran produced 24.44Mt of cement during the first four months of the current Iranian year, which began on 20 March 2012.

According to a report released by the public relations office of the Industries, Mines and Trade Ministry, about 6.43Mt of cement were produced in the country during the period between 20 June 2012 and 21 July 2012. The country produced 5.64Mt of clinker over the same period.

The latest estimates from the Ministry of Industries and Mines show that Iran will need 70Mt/yr of cement by 2021.

Spain: Spanish cement production fell by a further 60% year-on-year in the first half of 2012 according to Oficemen, the sector's national association. Oficemen noted that demand for cement in Spain has now dropped to a 48-year low, with levels as low as this not seen since 1964. The association previously announced that the country produced 6Mt of cement in the five months to 31 May 2012, but did not provide a total amount for the first half of 2012.

Consumption also fell, by 34.7%, year-on-year to 7.2Mt in the first six months of 2012. Oficemen expects demand to plunge by 25% to 15Mt for the full year. Accordingly, it is expected that exports from Spain will increase by 40% year-on-year to 6Mt in 2012.

These figures compare unfavourably with 2011's own poor figures and come as the Spanish economy continues to struggle with its Eurozone debt, protests at austerity measures and unemployment of 25%.

Vietnam: The Vietnamese minister of construction has claimed that the master development plan for the country's cement industry from 2011 to 2020 approved by the Prime Minister is still in line with market movements and that there is no 'cement crisis' in the country.

Trinh Dinh Dung said that Vietnam consumed 55Mt out of 64Mt of cement produced in 2011, with consumption accounting for 89% of production. "I confirm that there is no cement crisis caused by the development scheme as raised by some people," said the minister.

The country currently has a huge cement surplus given its low domestic consumption. Under a policy of public spending cuts, the amount of construction work is actually falling, pushing down consumption of building materials.The country is forecast to use 55-56Mt of cement in 2012, accounting for just 80% of its own output. "We can't say that the cement development plan triggers an oversupply crisis," said Dung.

One of the biggest questions is why the country still imports cement when it faces huge inventories. The minister explained the country must stick to local commitments that stipulate that ASEAN members cannot impose import bans or tariff barriers on cement. Furthermore, market forces also prompt cement imports, he said.

Cement is mainly produced in the north of Vietnam, resulting in high cement prices in the south due to transport fees. Sometimes, the price of local products gets higher than that of products imported from Thailand.

"In a market economy, the country must import goods from overseas markets at competitive prices if domestic production shows low efficiency," said the minister.

Czech Republic: Czech cement production posted a year-on-year drop of 14% to 466,000t in the Jan-March 2012 period owing to the fall of the construction sector and a colder winter, according to the latest data of the Czech Cement Producers' Association. Cement producers commented that domestic consumption and cement exports also went down.

"A combination of several effects was behind the significant drop in Czech cement production and consumption in the first quarter," said Ceskomoravsky cement board chairman Jan Hrozek. He also blamed unclear policies from the Czech Transport Ministry and the resulting changes that these had on priorities in infrastructure projects.

First-quarter cement sales on the domestic market were 8% lower at 404,000t. Exports sank by 24% over the same period. Cement producers have said that the outlook for 2012 is currently uncertain.

"Overall I expect domestic cement consumption to stagnate in 2012, with possible recovery to come at the end of the third quarter," Hrozek added.

Leading cement producers in the Czech Republic include Ceskomoravsky cement of the German group HeidelbergCement, French group Lafarge, Swiss company Holcim and the Czech branch of Dyckerhoff of Germany.

Vietnam: Vietnam's Ministry of Construction has announced that it will temporarily delay work on several approved cement projects in the country. The move was announced with the spectre of severe cement overcapacity looming over the country. In 2012 it is expected that the country will consume around 50Mt of cement, 10Mt short of its existing 60Mt/yr capacity, according to the Vietnam Cement Association (VCA).

The director of the ministry's Construction Materials Department, Le Van Toi, noted that many cement producers were facing losses due to decreasing consumption and high interest rates. "Many cement producers have had to borrow up to 80% of their total investment capital and that eats most of their profits while interest rates remain high," he said.

Toi said that the Thanh Liem Cement Plant in northern Ha Nam Province had to close its doors due to significant losses, although the plant has not yet declared bankruptcy. Many other plants have cut their capacity sharply. "If the situation continues, the number of cement plants that will have to shut down will surge in the near future," Toi warned.

VCA's chairman Nguyen Van Thien urged cement producers to boost their trade promotion and export heavily in 2012 to deal with the surplus. He expected that the producers could export more than 7Mt of cement in 2012, a massive increase over 2011, when the country exported 1.5Mt. Vietnamese cement is exported mainly to China, Indonesia and Bangladesh, as well as several African and southeast Asian countries.