Quarry Products

Italcementi, the world's leading cement manufacturer, is tipping stronger growth of 2-3% cent this year, with the key driver being Asia, backed by economic recoveries in the European Union and North America. Given the forecasted growth, the group plans to expand its businesses to African countries such as Mozambique, Ghana and Tanzania, CEO Carlo Pesenti said during an interview last week with the Bangkok, Thailand-based Nation Multimedia Group. "The company foresees better performance in Asia, including Th

Plans for a 20 acre expansion of Lafarge Tarmac’s Mountsorrel granite quarry in county Leicestershire, England have been approved. Lafarge Tarmac Aggregate will now be allowed to extract stone from land next to the firm's present operation. Despite strong concerns from residents and environmental groups who feared the expansion would impact on wildlife in ancient woodland beauty sites nearby, Leicestershire county councillors backed the plans on Thursday 12 March 2015. Lafarge says that the deeper Mountsorr

CW Research has released its 1H2015 Quantitative Update to the benchmark Global Cement Volume Forecast Report (GCVFR), the advisory and research boutique’s twice-yearly outlook for worldwide cement market volumes. The 1H2015 revision of the report forecasts a 2.9% in the pace of global cement demand growth in 2015, up to 4.3 billion tons, following a slower-than-expected increase of 2.6%, up to 4.1 billion tons in 2014. "We are seeing the global cement market making sure steps towards a more balanced future

Cement giants Holcim and Lafarge are said by the London Financial Times to be in talks to renegotiate the terms of their multi-billion euro merger after a divergence in the value of the two companies over the past year. Citing people familiar with the matter, the paper says the two sides are holding discussions that might result in changes to the terms of the one-for-one share deal announced in April 2014. Swiss firm Holcim recently announced healthy profit growth in its Q4 2014 results, contrasting markedl

A brick production plant is currently under construction in Ipatovo, Stavropol region of the North Caucasus, Russia, with investments estimated at RUB 750 million (€11.38 million/US$12.34 million). The plant will be capable of making 60 million pieces of conventional bricks and other baked clay products/year. The facility will reach its full capacity in May 2017, and a total of 200 new jobs will be created.

Estonian producers of building materials are said to be investing in production automation to replace unskilled jobs. This is revealed in a Swedbank's manufacturing industries survey, which involved 300 manufacturers with the combined turnover of €450 million, and of which building materials producers accounted for 15%. Some 56% of the manufacturers of building materials say they targeted turnover growth (by an average 5.4%) and 47% want to improve profitability in 2015. The share of exports is forecast to

The purchase of five entities belonging to UK building materials company Hanson Building by US private equity company Lone Star has been approved by the European Commission. A UK entity and four US entities belonging to Hanson Building are affected by the purchase. The commission concluded that there would be no overlapping of activities of Hanson Building's entities, as well as Lone Star itself and its company portfolio.

The administration of the province of Davao del Sur, the Philippines, has instructed Philmix Concrete Industries (Philmix) and Q Mix Concrete Industries (Q Mix) to cease the operations of their concrete plants in Barangay Tres de Mayo and Hagonoy, respectively. The instruction is issued after the two factories were reported to have been found guilty of operating without air pollution permits, environmental compliance certificates and business licences.