AIRLINK 158.34 Decreased By ▼ -6.04 (-3.67%)
BOP 10.40 Decreased By ▼ -0.17 (-1.61%)
CNERGY 8.26 Decreased By ▼ -0.14 (-1.67%)
CPHL 88.31 Decreased By ▼ -1.65 (-1.83%)
FCCL 47.20 Increased By ▲ 0.26 (0.55%)
FFL 14.82 Decreased By ▼ -0.42 (-2.76%)
FLYNG 26.50 Increased By ▲ 0.17 (0.65%)
HUBC 134.00 Decreased By ▼ -2.37 (-1.74%)
HUMNL 12.50 Decreased By ▼ -0.51 (-3.92%)
KEL 4.15 Decreased By ▼ -0.13 (-3.04%)
KOSM 5.41 Decreased By ▼ -0.20 (-3.57%)
MLCF 60.10 Decreased By ▼ -0.69 (-1.14%)
OGDC 208.41 Decreased By ▼ -6.48 (-3.02%)
PACE 5.42 Decreased By ▼ -0.12 (-2.17%)
PAEL 40.80 Decreased By ▼ -1.20 (-2.86%)
PIAHCLA 18.78 Increased By ▲ 1.04 (5.86%)
PIBTL 9.94 Decreased By ▼ -0.29 (-2.83%)
POWER 11.80 Decreased By ▼ -0.10 (-0.84%)
PPL 167.55 Decreased By ▼ -6.67 (-3.83%)
PRL 34.99 Decreased By ▼ -0.55 (-1.55%)
PTC 23.76 Increased By ▲ 0.82 (3.57%)
SEARL 93.00 Decreased By ▼ -2.04 (-2.15%)
SSGC 35.62 Decreased By ▼ -0.99 (-2.7%)
SYM 13.67 Decreased By ▼ -0.26 (-1.87%)
TELE 7.01 Decreased By ▼ -0.23 (-3.18%)
TPLP 9.98 Decreased By ▼ -0.29 (-2.82%)
TRG 60.10 Decreased By ▼ -1.43 (-2.32%)
WAVESAPP 9.60 Decreased By ▼ -0.72 (-6.98%)
WTL 1.30 Decreased By ▼ -0.02 (-1.52%)
YOUW 3.62 Decreased By ▼ -0.07 (-1.9%)
BR100 12,200 Decreased By -193.5 (-1.56%)
BR30 36,255 Decreased By -852.3 (-2.3%)
KSE100 113,971 Decreased By -1561.1 (-1.35%)
KSE30 35,148 Decreased By -513.8 (-1.44%)
Business & Finance

Capacity utilisation of Pakistan’s cement industry drops to lowest on record

  • At around 55%, this is the lowest level since at least FY2007
Published June 11, 2024
Image generated by AI
Image generated by AI

Capacity utilisation of Pakistan’s cement industry dropped to 54.64% during FY24 (July-April), its lowest level on record, revealed the Economic Survey 2023-24 unveiled on Tuesday evening by Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb.

Pakistan’s cement industry has an overall production capacity of 82.25 million tonnes, but local dispatches and exports totalled a paltry 37.45 million tonnes during the 10 months of the outgoing fiscal year.

This put capacity utilisation at around 55%, which is the lowest since at least FY2006-07. Data before this period was not available in terms of capacity utilisation.

 Source: Economic Survey 2023-24
Source: Economic Survey 2023-24

In FY2007, production capacity stood at 30.5 million tonnes with total dispatches at 24.26 million tonnes.

During these 17 years, the industry has taken its capacity to 82.25 million tonnes. However, in the current economic environment, the cement sector has been one of the hardest hit amid record high interest rates, runaway inflation and a rollback of development projects by the government becoming major headaches.

“The cement industry in Pakistan has faced multiple challenges,” stated the Economic Survey 2023-24 in its chapter on ‘Manufacturing and Mining’.

“The government’s fiscal constraints and limited foreign aid have delayed rehabilitation efforts in flood-affected areas and caused the overall slowdown of the construction sector.

“Additionally, the economic slowdown in global markets has resulted in lower cement exports to significant export destinations like Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, which have foreign exchange crises. Besides, the industry has also been impacted by the massive increase in prices of construction materials.”

Pakistan exports its cement and clinker to Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Maldives, Djibouti, Somalia, Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Mozambique, South Africa, Madagascar, Comoros, Seychelles, Iraq, Ethiopia, Qatar, and the USA, according to the Economic Survey.


Bilal Memon

Bilal Memon is the Head of Digital Content at Business Recorder. His Twitter handle is @bilalahmadmemon

Also read:

Comments

Comments are closed.