"The period of extraordinary growth in the construction equipment and building material machinery industry, which lasted for six years in a row, has now come to an end," says said Mr Dr Christof Kemmann, Chairman of the Construction Equipment and Building Material Machinery Industry’s Association (part of the VDMA).

Speaking at a board meeting in Frankfurt Mr Kemmann said: "Never before have we seen such a sudden and drastic decrease in incoming orders happening at so many companies, in so many different sectors and markets at the same time as in the last quarter of 2008.”

Incoming orders between October and December 2008 show a decrease by more than 30 per cent in total compared to the very high figures of the same period in 2007.

The association’s experts expect the current orders at hand to be totally fulfilled in the course of this year. This will go together with a steep decrease in turnover. The construction equipment machinery industry will be hit by this slump more severely than the building material, glass and ceramics machinery industry. Published under Cement News