Democratic Republic of Congo: South Africa’s PPC has agreed with its lenders to reschedule debts from the construction of a cement plant in Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The cement producer said that the total capital requirements for the DRC plant will now be limited to interest payments from January 2018 until January 2020, according to Reuters. The debt renegotiation has included an extension of the repayment period by an additional two years and a change to the interest rate.

PPC Barnet DRC is 69% owned by PPC, 21% owned by Barnet Group and the remaining 10% is owned by the International Finance Corporation (IFC). The plant is 60% debt funded by the IFC and Eastern and Southern African Trade and Development Bank.

France: Bénédicte de Bonnechose of the Syndicat Français de l’Industrie Cimentière (SFIC), the French cement union, says that the market is expected to have grown by 3 - 4% in 2017. Cement consumption reached 17.5Mt in 2016, according to the Agence France Press. De Bonnechose described the growth as a ‘sharp signal’ that the French cement industry was recovering following hitting its lowest levels since the 1960s.

India: Jaiprakash Associates has narrowed its loss to US$23m in the third quarter of its financial year from US$171m in the same period in 2016. Despite this its income fell by 30% year-on-year to US$178m from US$258m, according to the Press Trust of India. The company has sold its assets, including a large number cement plants to UltraTech Cement, to reduce debt.

France: Syndicat Français de l’Industrie Cimentière (SFIC), the French cement union, has launched Cement Lab, an initiative intended to connect startup companies to the cement industry. Bénédicte de Bonnechose, president of the SFIC, unveiled the project that will link new companies, industry and academia at Station F, a business incubator for startup located at the former Halle Freyssinet railway depot in Paris. Startups featured at the event included Combo Solution, 360 Smart Connect, XtreeE, Smart Cast and Red Bird, who are offering a drone-based method for mine and quarry visualisation.