France: The Vicat Group has reported that sales by its cement business fell by 4% year-on-year to Euro1.11bn in 2013 from Euro1.16bn in 2012. No reason was provided for this decline. The French building materials manufacturer produced 18Mt of cement in 2013. Across all business lines the company's sales remained flat at Euro2.29bn.
By region, Vicat saw cement sales fall by 7.6% year-on-year in France due to poor weather and 'challenging' economic conditions. Cement sales rose by 6.3% in the US, led by infrastructure growth in California. In Turkey cement sales rose by 16.7% and in West Africa sales fell by 4.7%.