Azerbaijan, Baku, Oct. 21 /Trend, A. Akhundov/
The largest cement plant of the South Caucasus Norm Cement will be running at full capacity in 2014, General Director of Azerbaijani company Norm, Hasan Yalcinkaya told journalists on Monday.
The production capacities of the plant, which was built in Garadagh district of Baku, makes up 1.6 million tonnes of clinker and two million tons of cement per year.
"We are currently importing clinker, and we will start production of clinker in January 2014. We plan to produce 50,000-60,000 tons of cement by the end of this year; we will reach full capacity next year. We well begin retail sales of cement in October-November this year," Yalcinkaya said.
The plant uses modern technologies, and equipment from leading manufacturers in Germany, France, Switzerland and the Netherlands have been installed at the plant.
According to him, in total the Norm Sement project demanded investments worth $400 million, and thus the project has become one of the largest projects in non-oil sector of Azerbaijan's economy.
Aside from that, the construction of the plant will reduce the import of cement and Azerbaijan will reduce the annual outflow of capital from the country to $150 million. According to the Norm's General Director, now only the local market is of interest to the company, and it does not currently focus on exports.
The second Eurasian Cement Forum is being held in Baku under the general partnership.