Pakistan exports register record growth of 144 per cent
Cement exports registered a record growth of 144 percent during August 2007 due to huge exports orders, over production and better quality, industry sources said.
They said that the cement industry in the country was growing rapidly for the last two years and its production capacity had raised by around 40 per cent to 30Mt from 21Mt. Statistics, made available from All Pakistan Cement Manufacturers Association (APCMA), show that during August the country’s cement export reached 575,987t as compared to 236,098t during the same period of 2006, depicting an increase of 339,889t or 144 per cent during the last month.
Local cement shipments reached 1,963,123t during the last month from 1,561,979t in August 2006. Last month, overall cement dispatches totalled 2,539,110t, or 41.21 per cent as compared to 1,798,077t during the same period last year.
In addition, the cement exports have crossed 1Mt-mark in just first two months (July-August) of the current fiscal. During July-August, the cement exports depicted an upsurge of 139 percent to 1,015,084t against 424,260t during same period of last fiscal.
The local dispatches during the first two months of 2008 fiscal year have reached 3,912,254t from 3,064,957t during July-August, depicting an increase of 28 per cent. Overall dispatches have gone up by 41.23 per cent to 4,927,338t during July-August from 3,488,857t during the same period of last year.
"Cement export would further increase in the future, as the export to India would resume within the next few days," said APCMA Secretary Shahzad Ahmed. He said that the Bureau of Indian Standard (BIS) had issued quality and export certificate to the two leading Pakistani cement manufacturers, Lucky Cement and Maple Leaf Cement.
"The issuance of BIS certificate was the major hurdle in the export to India," he said. He said the cement manufacturers had made massive investment under their expansion plans during the last three years, boosting the performance of the cement sector.
He said that the reconstruction process in Afghanistan and fast development work in Dubai had given rise to cement demand. Besides, the demand from Iraq had also pushed the country’s cement export to the all time high level during July-August of the current fiscal year.
Published under Cement News
