Laos: The Ministry of Industry and Commerce says that the value of cement exports rose by 25% to US$19m in the first quarter of 2018 from US$15.2m in the same period of 2017. However, imports fell by 14% to US$16.4m from US$19.1m, according to the Vientiane Times newspaper. Exports have risen as new production capacity has been commissioned in the country.

Laos exported a value of US$0.2m in 2016 but this grew to US$47.6m in 2017. Imports fell to US$68m in 2017 from US$84.3m in 2016. The country has 16 cement plants and other units are being built. At present the country has a capacity of 4.4Mt/yr. This is expected to grow to 6.7Mt/yr once all the current projects are completed. Local infrastructure projects are driving local demand including the several hydropower plants and the Laos-China railway.

Spain: FYM, a subsidiary of HeidelbergCement, is facing a potential legal battle to expand the quarry at its La Araña cement plant near Malaga. It has applied to the local government for a compulsory order to buy land at the site, according to the Diario Sur newspaper. FYM says that it has the authorisation to use up to 176 hectares near its plant for mineral extraction but that it is only using 43 hectares at present. The agreement in place allows the cement producer to buy land on a compulsory basis if an agreement can’t be reached with the land owners. However, the current land owner and FYM have disagreed over the price.

Cameroon: The Ministry of Finance forecasts that demand for cement will rise by 10% due to various infrastructure projects. The government department also indicated that some cement producers are increasing their production capacity, according to Business in Cameroon.

Cimencam, a subsidiary of LafargeHolcim, is planning to build a 0.5Mt/yr grinding plant at Nomayos in Yaoundé. It is expected to be complete in 2019. Dangote Cement plans to build a 1.5Mt/yr plant in Yaoundé and Ciments de l'Afrique (CIMAF) is upgrading its plant Douala to 1.5Mt/yr from 0.5Mt/yr. The CIMAF project is scheduled for completion also in 2019. Following commissioning of all the new projects, the market share of each cement producer is expected to be Dangote Cement with 45%, Cimencam with 30%, CIMAF with 22% and Medcem with 3%.

India: Larsen & Toubro has won an order to build cement plants in Odisha and Andhra Pradesh. The end client has not been named and no value has been disclosed. The cement plant orders were announced as part of a wider set of orders worth over US$590m, including government construction projects.

India: UltraTech Cement has agreed an acquisition schedule to buy the cement assets of Century Textiles & Industries. The cement production subsidiary of BK Birla Group comprises three integrated plants in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Maharashtra respectively with a combined production capacity of 11.4Mt/yr and a 1Mt/yr grinding plant in West Bengal.

The takeover has been arranged via a demerger process whereby Century Textiles’ shareholders will be given shares in UltraTech Cement. The deal is subject to approval from shareholders, creditors, competition bodies and others. It is expected to be completed by early 2019.

India: UltraTech Cement has won the Deora-Sitapuri-Udipyapura limestone mining block in Madhya Pradesh in a state auction. The block has a reserve of around 54Mt and it is spread over an area of 345 hectares. The company said that the block is near to the existing limestone quarry of its recently commissioned Dhar Cement plant. It added that the new limestone reserve would be useful in augmenting the capacity of the plant in the future.

India: Dalmia Bharat's subsidiary OCL India plans to build a new cement plant in Odisha. The new unit will have a production capacity of around 1.7Mt/yr and it will include a waste heat recovery system. It will bring the cement producer’s total cement capacity up to around 8Mt/yr in the states of Odisha and West Bengal. The project is estimated to cost around US$545m. The plant is expected to be completed by mid-2020.

India: Jaiprakash Associates’ sales have nearly halved following the sale of much of its cement business to UltraTech Cement in mid-2017. Its sales dropped to US$1.14bn in the year to the end of March 2018 from US$2.19bn in the same period in 2017. The company said that its annual results were not comparable due to the sale of six integrated cement plants and five grinding plants.

Nepal: Hongshi-Shivam Cement has started trial production at its new plant near Dumkibaas in Nawalparasi district. The joint venture between Nepal’s Shivam Holdings and Hong Kong Red Lion Cement No 3, a subsidiary of China’s Hongshi Group, plans to start commercial production by the end of June 2018, according to the Kathmandu Post. The Chinese company owns a 70% stake in the joint venture. The unit has a production capacity of 6000t/day.

In September 2017, the Investment Board of Nepal had signed a US$359m project investment agreement with Hongshi-Shivam Cement to build the plant. A 10km road was built to connect the site to the main local highway and another 22km road was built to link up a limestone quarry at Palpa. The company plans to double the unit’s production capacity to 12,000t/day by 2020.

Philippines: Holcim Philippines plants to spend US$45m towards increasing production capacity. Its new chief executive officer John Stull told The Manila Times newspaper that the company is looking to improve efficiency at its plants to improve logistics and cut energy costs. It is also planning to hasten its equipment maintenance schedule. The cement producer set a target to increase its cement production capacity to 12Mt by 2019.