Cement companies have urged the government to develop the infrastructure and increase enabling facilities aiming to give the export of the item to India and other SAARC countries a new height.
"Bangladesh has a target to export cement worth $ 7 million in this fiscal (2010-11), but without developing the infrastructure and solving the problems of non tariff barriers with India, the fulfillment of the target remains a mirage," an official of MI Cement Factory Ltd, the manufacturer of Crown Cement told the FE Monday.
Crown Cement is the top cement exporting company to India from Bangladesh since 2003.
"Our government should solve the problems of non-tariff barriers like issuance of visa through Akhaura landport to facilitate our export to India," another cement company source told this correspondent.
Bangladesh exported cement worth 0.125 million metric tonnes till May of 2010.
According to MI Cement Ltd, the company exported 68,000 MT Crown Cement fetching $ 5.48 million between the period of July 2009 to June, 2010.
The company earned $ 2.267 million through exporting cement in 2008-09 fiscal.
"Consumption of cement, one of the key backward linkages of the construction and real estate sectors is expected to witness phenomenal growth in Bangladesh in the coming months as major infrastructure projects like Padma Bridge, Dhaka-Chittagong four-lane highway will begin shortly," an industry observer said.
An official of Bangladesh Cement Manufacturing Association, said though cement consumption is growing, local manufacturers have to keep a large portion of their factories idle, as "local factories will be able to produce in full swing when those public construction works begin".
Presently there are 30 operational cement companies that can produce around 20 million tonnes of cement a year against a demand for 8.5 million tonnes.
Of them, Heidelberg Cement, Lafarge Surma Cement Confidence Cement, Meghna Cement, Niloy Cement, Aramit Cement, Padma Cement and Modern Cement are listed on the stock exchanges.
The eight listed cement companies now have a total of 115,791,374 shares in the stock market.
During construction of Bangabandhu Bridge, the government offered duty free facilities to the constructing firm to import machinery and raw materials for cement.
Some local companies are enhancing their production capacity, as domestic demand has consistently been on the rise for the past few years, except for 2007, along with increasing government initiatives, sector people said.
The government plans to complete construction of the 6.15-kilometre long Padma Bridge, which will be the largest civil engineering project of Bangladesh, and Dhaka-Chittagong express highway in its tenure.
The government's plans to set up several flyovers in Dhaka under the strategic transport plan and build 142 bridges across the country are expected to bring vibrancy to the cement sector.
"As local companies have improved a great deal in the last few years, construction firms are now collecting cement from local sources for big public projects," said another cement company source.
The sector people said local cement was used in a few recent public construction projects, including the Bhairab Bridge, and the Sixth Bangladesh-China Friendship Bridge (Mukterpur Bridge) in Munshiganj.
But local cement makers were not in the same condition 10 years ago.
During the construction of Bangabandhu Bridge on the Jamuna river, the constructing firm -- Hyundai Engineering and Construction Co Ltd -- had to set up a cement factory of its own to ensure cement supply to the mega project.
The local cement sector has since come a long way, meeting domestic demand and exporting to neighbouring countries.
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