Shree Cement plans to up capacity by 20% Next FY

Shree Cement plans to up capacity by 20% Next FY
25 March 2008


India’s  Shree Cement Ltd plans to increase its production capacity by 20% in the next financial year that begins April 1 to address an increased demand for cement, a senior company executive said.  
 
"We have set a target for ourselves to steadily increase capacity as the demand for cement rises. Next year we will raise capacity by 20% and will continue to maintain that rate for the next few years," Executive Director M. K. Singhi told Dow Jones Newswires in a recent interview.  
 
Shree Cement has a production capacity of 9.1Mta. In the current financial year, the company has so far manufactured around 6.2Mt at its plants in Jaipur, in the western Indian state of Rajasthan.  
 
The company plans to build additional plants in Rajasthan, in the central states of Chattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh, and eastern Orissa state. This is likely to increase its annual production capacity by 10Mt by 2012, he said, without saying how many plants the company will build.  
 
Currently, Shree has five clinker units in Rajasthan and six cement mills in Rajasthan and the northern state of Haryana. Clinker is the solid material produced in the first stage of making cement.  
 
The company plans to build a plant with an annual capacity of about 2Mt by the financial year that ends March 31, 2010. The company will invest about INR4 billion to INR6 billion to build the plant.  
 
"We are still exploring various possibilities on where we should base our new cement plant and grinding unit. Nothing has been decided yet," he said.  
 
March cement sales likely up 7.5% on month 
 
Singhi said the company expects to sell around 700,000t of cement in March, up from 651,000 tons in February and about 450,000t in March 2007.  
Published under Cement News