Displaying items by tag: Redundancy

Brazil: Votorantim Cimentos has said that no employee will lose their job before July 2020 as a result of the coronavirus lockdown. It joins 3300 other employers across the country as part of the No Dismissals Movement. Votorantim Cimentos CEO Marcelo Castelli said, “Our goal is to reassure our employees and their families, and to help minimise the economic and social impacts of the coronavirus pandemic.”

US: Lehigh Cement has announced plans to suspend operations at its 0.5Mt/yr Glens Falls, New York, plant and associated Moreau quarry by 1 May 2020 in response to the coronavirus outbreak. The move will see its local staff of 90 reduced to 36 for the duration of the shutdown. Times Union newspaper has reported that Lehigh Cement will cover the 54 dismissed employees’ health insurance payments and ‘provide assistance in applying for unemployment and other layoff-related benefits.’ Lehigh Cement Glens Falls plant manager David Dreyer said, “We look forward to the day when our nation's health is no longer at such risk and our customers' demand for cement products returns, so we can welcome our employees back and resume full operation.”

Estonia: Germany-based HeidelbergCement’s subsidiary Kunda Nordic Tsement has announced the planned closure of its 0.8Mt/yr integrated Kunda plant in Kunda, Lääne-Viru County in March 2020. Business World Magazine has reported the plant closure will result in 80 redundancies. The company has stated the reason for the closure as being that the plant’s equipment, which produces cement by the wet method, is economically unviable due to its CO₂ intensity.

The price of EU Emissions Trading System (ETS) emissions permits fell to Euro15.24/t of CO₂ on 18 March 2020, down by 30% from Euro21.71/t on 18 March 2020.

Denmark: FLSmidth has announced details of the business improvement initiative it gave forewarning of in late 2019. The cement technology supplier is sacking 500 staff. Its most recent Annual Report stated that it had 11,368 staff at the end of 2018, meaning that around 4.4% of employees will lose their jobs. 80 of these redundancies will effect employees at its Copenhagen headquarters, with the remainder impacting personnel at operations across the globe. “Despite a healthy pipeline, this is an unfortunate yet necessary action given the weakening market for large capital investments in 2019 and our ongoing efforts to improve internal efficiency,” said FLSmidth CEO Thomas Schulz.

Brazil: InterCement is to stop production at its integrated Pedro Leopoldo plant in Minas Gerais. It plans to temporarily run the unit as a cement terminal, according to Por Dentro De Tudo. The plant has 53 employees. 28 will be relocated to other plants in the company and the remaining 25 will be made redundant.

Kenya: The East African Portland Cement Company (EAPCC) plans to reduce its costs by making 220 workers redundant. It says it needs US$170m to return to profitability, according to the Business Daily newspaper. Other plans to reduce its debts include raising money through land sales and reducing its energy costs. It is considering selling over 2400 hectares of land in Athi River. It has already sold around 360 hectares to Kenya Railways for around US$50m.

The company currently has 821 contracted and permanent and pensionable employees. It intends to reduce its workforce by September 2019.

Argentina: Loma Negra is planning to make 100 staff redundant at its Barker cement plant in Buenos Aires. It employs 230 direct employees and 90 others at the site, according to Infobae. The cement producer says it is reducing staffing levels in order to adjust the plant’s production capacity to the local market. It has also threatened to close the plant entirely if it is unable to reach an agreement over the redundancies with the union.

Israel: Nesher Israel Cement has dismissed 20 workers at its Haifa plant. The redundancies took place in October 2018 due to a fall in production, according to the Globes newspaper. The company is also considering making staff change at its Ramla plant. Previously, Israeli cement producers have blamed Turkey and Greece for declining business and have lobbied for anti-dumping tariffs.

South Africa: PPC has started a cost cutting campaign at its head office following poor cement sales so far in 2018. A source quoted by Business Report told the newspaper that staff redundancies had taken place already. The fall in sales has been blamed on poor local economic growth, the impact of a value added tax (VAT) increase on consumer spending and problems in the construction industry, including a fall in large infrastructure projects and private non-residential building.

Zambia: Some 47 employees at Zambezi Portland in Ndola have been laid off while a further 63 are earmarked for retrenchment. The redundancies are due to reduction in business volume at the cement company, which is now faced with stiff competition from the newly commissioned Dangote Cement plant.

Zambezi Portland Cement operations director Danielle Ventriglia confirmed the retrenchment and said that the affected workers had been paid US$308/each in benefits. Ventriglia said that the retrenchments were necessitated by economic reasons and that the company would maintain a lean workforce. He added that the company was also working towards reclaiming the market share and had reduced its cement price significantly. Another 63 workers are expected to be retrenched in the next six weeks and the company would retain a workforce of 340 employees.