Displaying items by tag: Turkey

Poland: The Polish Cement Association (SPC) has forecast a 2% year-on-year drop in cement sales to 18.5Mt in 2021. President Krzysztof Kieres attributed the fall to growing imports and reduced construction due to a cold start to the year. He predicts that sales will rise again, by 4% to 19.3Mt, in 2022.

The SPC has warned that the industry faces large costs in meeting the European Green Deal’s required 40% CO₂ emissions reduction by 2030 and achieving carbon neutrality by 2050. In particular, the local industry noted that the rising European Union (EU) CO₂ price has caused a direct increase in electricity prices. It has called on the government and the EU to compensate it for this rise.

Imports of cement also present a key challenge. In 2020, imports of Belarusian cement increased by 80% to 440,000t and imports of Ukrainian cement increased by 50% to 32,000t. The association expressed strong support for the European Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) as a means of protecting the industry against imports both from neighbouring countries outside the EU and via polluting shipping from cement exporters further afield such as Turkey.

Turkey: The Turkish competition authority Rekabat Kurumu has launched a probe into alleged collusion by nine cement producers. The authority said that it is investigating AS Çimento, Bastas Baskent Çimento, Çimsa, Golas Goller Bolgesi Çimento, Konya Çimento, Kupeliler Endustri, Limak Çimento, Oyak Çimento and Brazil-based Votorantim Cimentos.

Turkey: Fatih Yücelik has been elected as the 24th chairman of the board of Türkçimento, the Turkish Cement Manufacturers’ Association. He succeeds Tamer Saka in the role.

Yücelik has worked as a senior executive in the construction sector. He currently works as the vice chairman of the board of directors and chairman of the executive board of Erçimsan Holding. He holds a number of positions with non-governmental organisations, including that of Eastern Anatolian Honorary Consul to the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, deputy chairman of the board of directors of Cement Industry Employers' Union (ÇEİS) and as a board member of Foreign Economic Relations Board (DEİK).

Turkey: Türkçimento, the Turkish Cement Manufacturers’ Association, says that it has held the sector’s first virtual cement conference and exhibition with the conclusion of Digitalcem on 21 April 2021. The event focused on the need to pioneer in the sector through innovative thinking. Topics included circular economy, sustainable and competitive products, green energy transformation, digital cement anddeveloping technologies. 22 companies hosted booths and over 360 participants took part in the two-day event.

Chair Tamer Saka said, “We keep close track of the European Union climate and environmental policies and the harmonisation process of Turkey’s cement sector, through the target of being a pioneer in our sector’s work performed within the framework of sustainability. In this scope, we started the Turkish Cement Sector Carbon Roadmap project at the end of 2020. We will present Turkey with the sector's roadmap by scrutinising the data on greenhouse gas emissions of almost all cement plants in Turkey.”

A great question was asked at yesterday’s Virtual Global CemTrans Seminar: what impact did the recent blockage of the Suez Canal cause to the cement industry? Luckily, Rahul Sharan from Drewry was on hand discussing freight costs following the start of the coronavirus pandemic.

As most readers will know, the Suez Canal was blocked in late March 2021 when the 200,000dwt Ever Given ran aground, at around six nautical miles from the southern entry of the canal. The ultra large container vessel was subsequently refloated and towed away just under a week later. While this was happening the fate of the ship became a global news story with business analysts totting up the cost of the obstruction. 40 bulk carriers were reported as waiting to transit the waterway the day after the blockage started and some of these were carrying cement. Reporting by the BBC noted that 369 ships were stuck waiting on either side of the blockage on the day before the ship was finally freed. The Suez Canal Authority (SCA) estimated their loss of revenue from the incident at US$14 – 15m/day. Analysts like Allianz placed the cost to the global economy at US$6 - 10bn/day.

In Sharan’s view the blockage of the Suez Canal happened at a potentially risky moment for cement and clinker shipping because there was already congestion in shipping lanes built up on the east coast of South America and around Australia. However, a delay of a week around the canal, followed by the resulting congestion dispersing quickly over the following days, does not seem to have had any major impact so far.

Sharan’s presentation at Global CemTrans also included a summary of cement shipping. The key takeaways were that clinker shipping overtook cement shipping in 2019 with a connected increase in fleets investing in handymax-sized vessels. He also pointed out the key cement and clinker importing countries in 2019, before the coronavirus pandemic started causing market disruption. For cement: the US, the Philippines and Singapore. For clinker: China, Bangladesh and the Philippines. Turkey and Vietnam were the biggest exporters for both in that year.

The Ever Given incident has highlighted the continued importance of the Suez Canal for global trade for commodities. Goods still need to be physically moved around, however much stuff we digitise. It also contrasts with the issues that the Egyptian cement sector has faced in recent years such as production overcapacity. While domestic cement plants have struggled to maintain their profits, plenty of cement carriers have been transiting through the Isthmus of Suez. Local producers may well have gazed at them and wondered where they were going.

One of them, Al-Arish Cement Company, took action in this direction this week with its first export shipment of clinker. The Clipper Isadora ship disembarked East Port Said port for Ivory Coast. Future shipments are planned for West Africa, Canada, the US and Europe. Ship tracking reveals that the Clipper Isadora has not taken the Suez Canal on this occasion.

The proceedings pack for the Virtual CemTrans Seminar 2 2021 is available to buy now

Central America: Imports from Vietnam accounted for 30% of total cement imports to Central America in the first nine months of 2020. The country accounted for no significant share of cement imports to the region as recently as 2016. Central America Data has reported that Turkey supplied 18% of regional cement imports in the first nine months of 2020. Mexico supplied 8% and Barbados 4%.

Ukraine: Ukrcement, the Ukrainian cement association, has lobbied for cement to be excluded from a free trade agreement being arranged between Ukraine and Turkey. Pavel Kachur, the head of Ukrcement, said that he had informed the Ministry of Economy and the trade representative of Ukraine about the association’s view, according to Interfax-Ukraine. He said that the local cement sector was able to fully provide consumers with cement. He also noted the significantly higher cement production capacity in Turkey compared to Ukraine. In mid-2020 the Interdepartmental Commission for International Trade explored a complaint by local cement producers including Buzzi-Unicem subsidiary Dyckerhoff, HeidelbergCement subsidiary Kryvyi Rih Cement and CRH subsidiary Podilsky Cement into imports of cement from Turkey.

US: Data from the US Geological Survey (USGS) shows that cement producers achieved volumes of 87Mt of Portland cement in 2020, a slight increase from 2019 levels. Portland and masonry cement volumes rose by 1% year-on-year to 89Mt from 88Mt, while clinker volumes remained level at 79Mt. Total cement shipments remained level at 103Mt. The value of shipments in 2020 was US$12.7bn. Total exports of cement and clinker were 1.0Mt, down from slightly over 1.0Mt in 2019. The USGS said that on-going upgrades, closed and mothballed plants, low capacity utilisation and relatively inexpensive imports constrained the industry’s growth.

Domestic consumption fell by less than 1% to 102Mt from 103Mt. Cement imports totalled 15.0Mt, up slightly from 14.7Mt, while clinker imports rose to 1.4Mt from 1.2Mt. This corresponded to a 15% rise in reliance on imports of cement and clinker. The main exporters of cement and clinker to the country were Canada, accounting for 33% of US imports, Turkey (16%), Greece (15%) and China (12%).

Turkey: Nuh Cement exported 4.5Mt of cement in 2020, corresponding to 22% of Turkish seaborne cement and clinker exports and over 2% of global seaborne cement and clinker in the year. It says the volume is the highest recorded in any year by a Turkish cement producer. The company also delivered the highest exports to the US from Turkey.

Nuh Cement international sales and marketing and port director Abdulhamit Akçay said, “I would like to extend my gratitude first and foremost to our respected clients, my export and port team under my command, production group management, maintenance group management, the purchasing department, the finance department, the human resources department, the information technology department and all other units and colleagues whose names have not been referred to, and our general manager and lastly but especially to our group chief executive officer who has led us with a unique leadership.”

Guatemala: Local cement producers have expressed concern over the quality of rising imports from Asia. Issues over quality standards and packaging have been raised, according to the El Periódico newspaper. According to data from the Bank of Guatamala, cement imports worth around US$57m were reported in the first 11 months of 2020. Imports from Turkey and Vietnam represented 85% of this. The country has a cement production capacity of 5.5Mt/yr and domestic consumption is around 3Mt/yr.