May cement consumption was 16 per cent higher than 3.08Mt in the preceding month.
In the first five months of the year, nationwide cement consumption grew 20 per cent to 15.41Mt.
“I suspect consumers speeded up their cement purchases and construction activities because they anticipated increases in the price of cement,” Urip Timuryono, head of Indonesian Cement Association (ASI), told Thomson Financial.
Consumers may have feared that producers would hike their cement selling prices to pass on the cost of soaring crude oil prices, he said.
