Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 25
By Umid Niayesh - Trend:
Iran is gradually losing its domestic and foreign cement markets, Abdolreza Sheikhan, secretary of Iran's Cement Industry Employers Association said.
Iran's cement industry has lost some 8 percent of its domestic markets and 20 percent of markets abroad in the first five months of current fiscal year (March 21-Aug. 22), Sheikhan said, Iran 's Tasnim news agency reported.
"Cement supply and demand is not balanced in the market and this has created problems for producers."
However he did not disclose exact statistics about the country's cement sell.
All cement producing plants are permitted to store clinker equal to its two months output, meanwhile currently some 5 million tons of surplus clinker is stored in the country, Sheikhan said.
Iran produced about 29.95 million tons of cement in the first five months of the current Iranian fiscal, 5 percent less year-on-year.
Some 26.29 million tons of clinker also produced in the mentioned period, indicating 21.5 percent fall compared to the same months of previous year.
Tehran exported 18.942 million metric tons of cement and clinker in the past Iranian fiscal year (ended on March 21), a one percent rise year on year.
Iran currently exports cement to 24 countries including Iraq, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kuwait, Pakistan, Qatar, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, Georgia, Oman, India, and China .
The country produced over 61 million metric tons of cement and 64 million metric tons of clinker in the past fiscal year.
Edited by CN
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