Displaying items by tag: Shutdown

Under the current circumstances it’s not surprising to see how much Indian cement production fell in April 2020. Like many other countries, its lockdown measures to combat the coronavirus outbreak suppressed industrial output. Yet seeing an 86% year-on-year fall in the world’s second largest producer is shocking. Cement production declined to 4.1Mt from 29.2Mt. Further data shows, as part of the Indian government’s eight core industries, that steel and cement production suffered the most. Coal, crude oil, natural gas, petroleum refinery products, fertilisers and electricity generation all fell by far less.

Graph 1: Change in Indian cement production year-on-year (%). Source: Office of the Economic Adviser.

By comparison in China monthly cement output only fell around 30% at the peak of its outbreak. The difference is that China implemented a graduated lockdown nationally, with the toughest measures applied in Wuhan, the place the outbreak was first identified. As we reported in April 2020 demand for cement in Wuhan had fallen by around 80% at the time its lockdown ended. Production and demand are different, but India’s experience feels similar except that it’s on a national scale. The last time the country had a dip in cement production recently was in late 2016 when the government introduced its demonetisation measures and dented cement production growth rate (and national productivity) in the process.

UltraTech Cement, Orient Cement, Ambuja Cement, India Cement, Dalmia Bharat, JK Lakshmi Cement, Shree Cement and others all suspended operations to varying degrees in the first phase of the lockdown in late March 2020. Operations of industrial plants in rural areas was then cleared to restart in mid-April 2020, although subject to local permissions and social distancing rules, as the country’s lockdown zones took shape. All of this started to show in company results towards the end of March 2020 as sales started to be hit. The worst is yet to filter through to balance sheets.

March 2020 was a particularly bad time for the government to shut down cement plants because it is normally the month when annual construction work peaks. Cement production usually hits a high around the same time. The monsoon season then follows, reducing demand, giving producers a poor time to restart business. Credit ratings agency Care Ratings has forecast that capacity utilisation will drop to 45% in the 2020 – 2021 financial year. This follows a rate of 65 – 70% over the last six years with the exception of 2019- 2020, which was dragged down to 61% due to lockdown effects. On top of this labour issues are also expected to be a major issue to the sector returning to normality. The mass movement of workers back to their homes made world-wide news as India started its lockdown. Now they have to move back and Care Ratings thinks this is unlikely to complete until after the monsoon season, by September 2020. Hence, it doesn’t expect a partial recovery until the autumn, nor a full recovery until January 2021 at the earliest.

Not everybody is quite as gloomy though. HM Bangur, the managing director at Shree Cement recently told the Business Standard newspaper that he was expecting a rebound following the resumption of production in May 2020. He also reported a capacity utilisation rate of 60% at his company, higher than Care Rating’s prediction above, and he noted a difference between demand in rural areas and smaller cities (higher) compared to bigger cities (lower).

India is now pushing forward with plans to further unlock its containment measures to focus on the economy. However, daily reported news cases of coronavirus surpassed 8000 for the first time on Sunday 31 May 2020. How well its more relaxed lockdown rules will work won’t be seen for a few weeks. While this plays out we’ll end with quote from HM Bangur that will resonate with cement producers everywhere: “sales are imperative.”

Australia/New Zealand/US: Ireland-based James Hardie has announced the planned closure of three of its fibre cement board plants. The Cooroy, Queensland plant in Australia, Summerville, South Carolina plant in the US and Penrose, Auckland plant in New Zealand will close permanently in mid-2020, resulting in a total of 375 job cuts. The NZ Herald newspaper has reported that the decision to shut the plants came about due to the impacts of the coronavirus outbreak on the global economic situation. James Hardie will now supply the New Zealand market from its Carole Park, Queensland and Rosehill, New South Wales plants. James Hardie also closed its Siglingen, Baden-Württemberg plant in Germany on a temporary basis, ‘in order to better match supply and demand in the European market.’

James Hardie revised its 2020 profit forecast to US$355m, down by 4.1% from US$370m.

Egypt: Suez Cement, a HeidelbergCement subsidiary has implemented of a 20% reduction in pay for members of the management committee and a 30% reduction in pay for the managing director in the second quarter of 2020. The cuts are intended as a ‘cost-saving measure’ in line with the company’s aim to reduce expenses. Suez Cement said, “During the last few years the Egyptian cement industry has been going through very challenging times caused by oversupply and a sustained decrease in the demand, and Suez Cement Group has posted negative results. The COVID-19 crisis has complicated market conditions, affecting demand and increasing our costs. Moreover, it has affected our main shareholder, HeidelbergCement. In many countries it has suffered complete shutdowns and it is currently enduring complications in most of the countries that is present.”

Suez Cement continues to employ all staff.

Slovenia: Salonit Anhovo suspended production from 20 April 2020 to 4 May 2020. SeeNews has reported the reason for the suspension as a lack of demand from its usual Italian and Slovenian markets amid the ongoing coronavirus crisis. Salonit Anhovo management board member Dejan Zwitter said, "We expect domestic sales to stabilise as the government is providing incentives for construction activities."

The company will continue to serve its customers with deliveries of it products.

Data is starting to emerge about how the Chinese cement industry has coped with the economic effects of government action regarding the coronavirus. National cement industry output fell by 29% year-on-year to 150Mt in the combined months of January and February 2020. Output then picked up to 149Mt in March 2020, a drop of 17% compared to March 2019. These are massive figures, larger than the annual output of most countries, but they give some idea of what shutting down economies does to demand for cement and concrete.

Graph 1: Year-on-year change in cement output in China, April 2018 - March 2020. Source: National Bureau of Statistics of China. Note that accumulated data is issued for January and February each year so these months show a mean figure.

Graph 1 above gives the general picture of changes in cement output in China over the last couple of years. Growth fell in early 2018 as the government implemented its supply-side reforms, including measures such as industry consolidation and peak shifting. This improved in the second half of the year and throughout 2019. January and February output has been steady for the last few years, possibly due to peak shifting, but this year the trend was massively more pronounced. In March 2020, meanwhile, output fell by 17% compared to a rise of 17% in 2019. On the demand side, reporting from the Chinese Cement Association reveals that national infrastructure investment (excluding electricity) decreased by 19.7% year-on-year in the first quarter of 2020. National real estate development investment fell by 7.7% to US$310bn.

The figures above are for the whole of China whilst the outbreak was centered in Wuhan in Hubei province. The government implemented its toughest public health measures in this city and the surrounding Hubei province, with other regions using social distancing and tracking methods to various degrees. The Chinese Cement Association explains that, once other cities in Hubei province were released from lockdown, construction projects were allowed to resume but that progress was limited due to a lack of workers. Three weeks after measures were relaxed, the average shipping rate for cement producers was only 60% in these outer regions. In Wuhan the situation was more stark with demand for cement at only 20% of expected levels at the time the lockdown ended on 8 April 2020. Data from the Hubei Cement Association reports that on 30 March 2020 only half of Hubei province’s 57 clinker production lines were producing cement. The rest were suspended. To compound the problems here once logistics networks started to reopen imports of cement from other provinces flooded in taking advantage of price differences.

Few if any of the larger domestic producers have released their first quarter financial results for the first quarter of 2020. Huaxin Cement has said that its sales fell by 36% and that this is expected to cause a profit drop of 46% year-on-year to US$100m. Shanshui Cement has said likewise, although it has not released any forecasts. In its annual report for 2019 released in early April 2020, Anhui Conch said that the coronavirus had exerted a ‘short-term negative impact’ on the group’s business due to the slowdown in supply and demand in the construction materials industry. CNBM also acknowledged the situation in its 2019 report saying that it would, ‘impact on economic activity.’ CNBM’s subsidiary BNBM, a gypsum wallboard manufacturer, has released a forecast for the first quarter predicting a 90% drop in net profit due to poor sale volumes.

How this can inform the cement industries of other countries around the world that have enacted restrictions on their populations is unclear. China, as ever, is an exceptional outlier both economically and as a cement producer. Plus, the severity of how a country enacts a lockdown is crucial here. If the early reports above are indicative then half of Hubei’s clinker lines were forced to suspend production, demand for cement fell by 80% at the time the lockdown ended and imports headed in once transport networks were reopened. Issues were also noticed with labour shortages. Forewarned is forearmed as they say. The next point of focus will be how fast the Hubei and Chinese cement industry recovers from this shock. More on this as we have it.

India: Operations of industrial units in rural areas are clear to resume as of 20 April 2020, subject to local permissions and social distancing rules. Dion News Service has reported that JK Lakshmi Cement has resumed operations at two grinding units in Gujarat, JK Cement has resumed reduced operations at its 3.0Mt/yr integrated Muddapur plant in Karnataka and UltraTech has resumed operations ‘at some of the company’s locations.’ Ambuja Cements, ACC, ICC and India Cements all announced plans to return to full capacity utilisation in phases.

As part of phase two of India’s coronavirus lockdown, public spaces remain closed and public transport is suspended until 3 May 2020.

Armenia: The government has included cement production under a list of permitted economic activities able to resume from 16 April 2020. Azbarez News has reported that the present lockdown is scheduled to continue until 15 May 2020. Cement and clinker imports from neighbouring Iran, historically the main source of construction cement for Armenia, have continued throughout the coronavirus crisis.

Russia: Italy-based Buzzi Unicem subsidiary SKL Cement has supplied 400t of cement to the site of an upcoming coronavirus hospital in Omsk, Omsk Oblast. SLK Cement CEO Andrei Immoreev said, “In a difficult time for the whole world, our company continues to work to provide cement for construction sites of regional and federal facilities,” according to AMF News.

On 16 April 2020 the government launched a raft of measures, including subsidies for construction companies to keep jobs open and paid, to help the sector to recover after the crisis. and Major infrastructure projects in all regions will continue.

Thailand: Siam City Cement has closed the production lines at its Plant 1 integrated cement plant in Saraburi province due to a lack of demand resulting from the coronavirus outbreak. In a statement the company said that, “The aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic is seriously affecting the overall economic system and has already caused the global business and industrial sectors. The impact on us has been the drastic decline in demand both from domestic and regional markets.” It added that the closure was not expected to have an adverse impact on its operations. It is offering a ‘Mutual Separation Plan’ to affected workers in accordance with and beyond local labour regulations.

Normal production will continue at its Plant 2 and Plant 3 sites. In its 2019 annual report the cement producer said that it operated three cement plants in Kang Koi District, Saraburi Province with a total of six kilns and a combined clinker capacity of 13Mt/yr. However, only five kilns were in operation at this time with a combined production of 12Mt/yr.

This news story has been updated following clarification from Insee Cement.

Germany: Gebr. Pfeiffer has launched a range of webinars and individual analysis and advice sessions in order to support cement producers preparing for start-up after the global coronavirus crisis. The services include webinars about vertical roller mill grinding and the Gebr. Pfeiffer MVR roller mill range and ready2grind modular system, as well as individual remote inspections. Gebr. Pfeiffer is also offering individual start-up support sessions.