South Africa: PPC estimates that local cement demand fell by 3 – 4% in 2017 due to a lack of large infrastructure projects. In an operating update for the nine months to 31 December 2017 it reported that its cement sales volumes fell by 1 – 2% year-on-year, although it had increased its prices. It increased its exports by 23%. The cement producer also reported that its Slurry Kiln 9 project was 90% complete, with commissioning scheduled for the second quarter of 2018.

Elsewhere in Africa, PPC’s sales volumes rose by 20 – 30% in Rwanda due to a rise in bulk cement sales and higher exports. In Zimbabwe sales volumes grew by 30 – 40% supported by retail sales.

Ivory Coast: Jean-Claude Brou, the Minister of Industry and Mines, has inaugurated a new mill at LafargeHolcim Ivory Coast’s plant at Abidjan. The new mill has increased the unit’s production capacity to 2Mt/yr, according to the Agence Ivoirienne de Presse. LafargeHolcim Ivory Coast re-used a ball mill from a Spanish cement plant that was dismantled and shipped to Abidjan. The mill uses a 4.5MW motor and the cement producer says it is the largest horizontal ball mill in French-speaking West Africa. The project cost US$28.5m.

Burkina Faso: Cimburkina has started upgrading its Kossodo cement grinding plant. The US$2.85m project will centre on the installation of a new mill. This will double its production capacity to 2Mt/yr, according to the Sidwaya newspaper. Other works will include a new 2000t limestone silo and a new bagging unit. The new mill is scheduled to start production in December 2018.

The plant, a subsidiary of Germany’s HeidelbergCement, produces two types of cement: CEM II 42.5 R and CEM II BL 32.5 R. Clinker for production comes from the group’s Scantogo plant in Togo.

Tunisia: Carthage Cement has completed the loading of its first clinker shipment to Sub-Saharan Africa. The 38,000t consignment was loaded at the port of La Goulette. It is part of a 350,000t deal that the cement producer announced in December 2017.