Brazil: Brazil has reported a growth in annual sales volumes for the first time since 2014. Producers sold 54.5Mt of cement – up by 3.5% from 52.8Mt in 2018 and exceeding SNIC president Paulo Camillo Penna’s January 2019 forecast of 3.0% growth. Penna has predicted a 3.6% increase to 56.5Mt in 2020. Valor newspaper has reported that Penna bases his assumption on favourable interest rates and low inflation of the Brazilian real as well as the government’s implementation of anticipated industrial policies favourable to production.

Turkey: Sabanci Holding and HeidelbergCement joint subsidiary Akçansa achieved an undisclosed Turkish record figure for nine-month cement exports over the period ending 30 September 2019. The exports included 1Mt of clinker. Akçansa general manager Umat Zenar said, “We achieved a 46% increase in our port capacity utilisation rate,” in attributing the growth to its logistics advantage over competitors and effective port management.

Saudi Arabia: Producers in Saudi Arabia sold 4.7Mt of cement in December 2019, representing a year-on-year increase of 24%. The figure exceeded November’s sales volumes of 4.3Mt by 9.3%.

UK: Cemex has entered a conditional agreement with Breedon Group for the divestment of certain UK assets, including 49 ready-mix plants, 28 aggregate quarries and a cement terminal for Euro211m including Breedon Group’s assumption of Euro27.3m lease liability. Cemex UK retains the 1.2Mt/yr Rugby cement plant in Warwickshire. Breedon Group CEO Pat Ward said, “We expect the deal to be accretive to both earnings and free cash flow in the first full year, with a positive ongoing impact on the cash generation of the enlarged Group.” Cemex CEO Fernando Gonzalez said that the transaction ‘further rebalances our portfolio into our core markets, enhances our profitability and enables us to continue to focus on deleveraging.’

The businesses being handed over also include concrete products operations, depots and asphalt plants and fall under all six of Breedon Group’s regional divisions. Ward has said the acquisitions will significantly enlarge the group’s footprint in underrepresented divisions, implying that the cement terminal in question may be the Leith terminal in Scotland or the Newport terminal in Wales, two regions in which the company currently has no terminals to receive cement produced at its 1.5Mt/yr integrated Hope cement plant in Derbyshire. Breedon Group will seek to hire employees working on the operations from Cemex and expects to bring its total UK personnel to 3600 people as a result. It says its mineral reserves will exceed 1.0Bt.

Cemex UK retains 259 concrete plants and 36 aggregates quarries and dredging operations. Cemex said it ‘will retain a substantial integrated business in the UK encompassing cement production.’