Indian cement industry makes rapid strides

Emerges 2nd largest globally

MUMBAI, July 02, 2012 (BusinessNewsbank): The Indian cement industry has registered a phenomenal growth contributing handsomely to the exchequer.

Starting with a mere 1.47 million tonne capacity s at the time of the independence, the Indian Cement industry is now globally competitive in technology, quality and cost of production, with a capacity of 320 million tonnes, emerging as the world’s largest cement producer after China.

It is the fourth largest contributor to the Union Excise duties and employs 10 million people directly or indirectly.

India has a cement capacity of about 320 million tonnes distributed amongst 47 players, not including mini cement plants.

In the last three years, around 100 million tonne of capacity has been added. It is pertinent to note that for every new plant, it takes at least three years to ramp up the capacity to 100% percent.

In the first two years, new plants could typically operate at about 45% and 65 % of their capacity. Hence capacity utilization numbers could be misleading unless read with the age of the plant.

So if 20 million ton capacity is added in one year, it could mean that only 45 per cent of that, i.e. 9 million tonnes can actually be produced in that year.