21 November 2017
Dangote to commission Congo plant 21 November 2017
Congo: Dangote Cement will officially open its 1.5Mt/yr capacity cement plant in Congo on Thursday 23 November 2017. Constructed for around US$500m, the plant is expected to directly employ more than 1000 people, while thousands of indirect jobs will also be created. The plant, which is now the largest in Congo, rolled out its first bag of cement on 7 August 2017. The company's third quarter unaudited results showed that the Congo plant, which recently began operations, has almost doubled cement capacity of the country.
The Congo plant commissioning will bring the number of Dangote Cement’s fully operational plants across Africa to 10. The company is currently active in 17 African countries.
New plants coming to Kenya 21 November 2017
Kenya: The founder of Devki Group, Narendra Raval, plans to invest in the construction of a 0.75Mt/yr cement plant in Mariakani, Kilifi County, in direct competition with ARM Cement’s facility in the county. The project, which represents a US$290m investment, will be built on a 20 hectare site. “Construction of a new cement plant will further bring down prices while reducing the long distances lorries must cover to deliver cement to Kenyans on their doorstep,” said Raval, according to Business Daily Africa.
In separate news, Global Choice has concluded plans to build a grinding plant in Athi River, Machakos County. The US$48m facility has a capacity of 1Mt/yr.
Peruvian sales increase in October 2017 21 November 2017
Peru: A total of 925,000t of cement was sold in Peru in October 2017, an increase of 12.1% compared with sales in October 2016 and 3.3% above sales in September 2017, according to data from Asocem. Cement production stood at 922,000t, 6.3% higher than October 2016 and 4.4% higher than September 2017. Domestic sales stood at 873,000t, 5.8% higher than in October 2016 and 4.4% compared to September 2017. Cement production hit 8.19Mt in the first 10 months of 2017, 2.1% down year-on-year. Domestic cement sales reached 7.85Mt in the first 10 months of 2017, 1.5% down year-on-year. Total sales, including exports, reached 8.15Mt in the first 10 months of 2017, 1.9% down year-on-year.
Hurricanes halve cement demand in Puerto Rico 21 November 2017
Puerto Rico: Cement sales in Puerto Rico contracted by 47.1% in October 2017 compared to the same period of 2016, due to the effects Hurricanes Irma and Maria. Cement sales had been falling generally since 2013 and they fell by 12.3% in 2016. Meanwhile, cement production declined by 52.9% year-on-year in October 2017. Cement production dropped by 11.5% in 2016, representing the fourth consecutive year of decline in the commonwealth.
CRH reports steady improvement in third quarter 21 November 2017
Ireland: CRH’s like-for-like group sales for the third quarter of 2017 rose by 3%, boosted by continued underlying growth in the Americas, although some operations were hit by adverse weather. CRH, which is in the final stages of buying US-based Ash Grove Cement for Euro2.98bn, added that it continues to expect another year of progress in 2017, with earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) of more than Euro3.2bn. This is 2.2% higher than the Euro3.13bn EBITDA it saw during 2016.
Group sales for the nine months as a whole were Euro20.7bn, an increase of 2% compared to the same period if 2016. EBITDA for the nine months was also 2% higher at Euro2.43bn.
Global coal prices pile pressure on Pakistan’s cement producers 21 November 2017
Pakistan: Rising coal prices are presenting a risk to the profit margins of cement manufactures in Pakistan. It is expected that this sustained rise in coal prices will increase the cost of cement production in the short-term.
Major contributory factors to the higher coal prices include China’s imposition to cut production to 276 days to reduce the supply glut since October 2016, while extra safety checks are resulting in tightened domestic coal supplies in the country. Moreover, tropical storms in the Atlantic basin and floods in Australia and Indonesia are giving rise to logistical issues with coal supply. Nuclear outages in France are driving extra competition for coal.
To add to the already worsened supply situation, South Africa`s National Union of Mine workers (NUM), which represents 70% of employees in the coal mining sector, started a strike on 19 November 2017 over unresolved wage disputes.