Pakistan cement sector registers 47pc rise in profit in 2007

The industry sources pointed cement prices, which hold the key to the sector’s performance as profitability of companies was more sensitive to prices rather than volumetric sales. Companies also needed to increase prices to undo the effect of rising input costs. ‘If the companies are able to enter into some sort of a price arrangement, it would considerably improve cement sector’s profitability; they said. They industry sources said that new export markets in India and Middle East, provide good opportunity to cement companies for using up their additional capacity and thus achieving better economies of scale. Latest data released suggested that cement sales during first half (Jul-Dec) of fiscal 2008 depicted an increase of 23 percent to stand at 13.8mn tons, thanks to the expanding local demand and growing cement shortage in the region leading to higher exports. Export sales thus have shown a commendable increase of 141 percent while local dispatches saw a rise of 9 percent during the period. On the contrary, alone in the month of Dec 2007, total cement dispatches stood at 1.8mn tons versus 2.1mn tons in Dec 2006, depicting a decline of 13 percent whereas local sales decreased by 24 percent to 1.4mn tons while exports maintained positive growth of 83 percent to land at 386k tons. They said that almost 60 per cent has gone through the sea route and the rest by rail of the total quantity imported. Moreover, average price of cement that was exported through rail route stood at US$72/ton (Indian Rs144/bag), while price of cement shipped through sea was recorded at US$68/ton (Indian Rs136/bag). With inclusion of cost of transportation from port or station, cement reaches a consumption site at Indian Rs165/bag, which is still significantly cheaper than Indian Rs235-250 per bag price for cement manufactured in India. They said that the cement prices have risen slightly in second quarter of fiscal 2008, which have not matched increase in input costs. Moreover, with the arrival of winter season, local demand is expected to slow down due to reduction in working hours in North.

All part of the "bubble" growth .... hahahahaha

I bet some folks would even call growth in the Cement & concete industry to be "Bubble" growth.

Just quick ... question ... you know what they make out of Cement?

This profit is due to heavy international demand leading to booming cement export this year, not domestic sales.
Did you bother to read the article?

All this rise because of zardari & nawaz

Yes, i did ... But i was only refering to the growth in the Cement industry

So was I, the cement sector didn't grow due to domestic demand which did not have any growth. It grew due to international demand.