Global Cement News

Oman: Cyclone Mekunu has forced Raysut Cement to stop production for eight to 10 days. The cement producer said that the storm caused external damage to its plant at Salalah and flooded production buildings and the stockyard.

Brazil: Cemex Latam has signed an agreement to sell its stake in Cimento Vencemos do Amazonas to Votorantim Cimentos for US$30m. Cimento Vencemos do Amazonas operates a river cement terminal in Manaus in Amazonas, according to the La Republica newspaper. The deal is subject to approval by the Brazilian and Colombian competition bodies and the Brazilian waterways transportation agency.

Nigeria: Lafarge Africa’s chairman Mobolaji Balogun says that the company plans to cut its debts by 2020 before continuing with its expansion programme. In an interview with Bloomberg he said that the cement producer wants reduce its leverage ratio to below 70% from over 100% at present.

The subsidiary of LafargeHolcim wants to take advantage of improvements in the Nigerian economy and a recovery in South Africa to grow its profits. Its total debt recently dropped to about US$600m. Lafarge Africa incurred debt to expand the production capacity at its Calabar cement plant and plans to add more production to plants in the southwest and the north of the country.

Egypt: Cemex is supplying around 0.76Mt of cement to build tunnels underneath the Suez Canal. It is also providing over 0.5Mm³ of concrete for the projects that will link the mainland to the Sinai Peninsula and the development of a commercial seaport. The work is being managed by a joint venture with Orascom Construction and Saudi Arabia’s Osman Ahmed Osman. The two tunnels will extend from the outskirts of Port-Said to the Sinai Peninsula, passing under the Suez Canal. The construction of the two 4km tunnels required the installation of three ready-mix batch plants on site to fulfil the project’s concrete demands.

India: Grasim Industries plans to invest up to US$870m in its cement business by the end of 2021. The subsidiary of Aditya Birla that also operates UltraTech Cement, wants to modernise its existing cement plants, carry out environmental upgrades and increase the production capacity of the units it acquired from Jaiprakash Associates, according to the Mint newspaper.

Aditya Birla Group’s chief financial officer Sushil Agarwal said that the company wants to increase the capacity utilisation rate of the former Jaiprakash Associates cement plants to over 85%, the standard level for the other UltraTech Cement plants. He added that on average cement plants in India have a capacity utilisation rate of 75%.