HANOI: According to preliminary statistics in Vietnam of the General Department of Customs, in the first eight months of 2017, the country exported 12.17Mt of cement and clinker reached US$430.63m. The cement volume was up 20.5 per cent and clinker volume up 13.2 per cent over the same period last year. In August alone, exports of 1.38Mt of cement and clinker reached US$54.09m (down 0.9 per cent in volume, but up seven per cent in value against July 2017.
Vietnam’s average export price of cement in the first eight months of 2017 was US$35.4/tn. The highest export price to Laos is US$66.2/t, followed by Cambodia US$52.6/t. Cement and clinker exports in August 2017 averaged US$39.07/t, an increase of eight per cent compared to July 2017, but down 0.6 per cent from August 2016. In August, the price of cement and clinker exported to Southeast Asian countries was high at around US$51/t of which, exports to Laos reached the highest price of US$69.2/t, the Philippines reached US$52.8/t, Cambodia US$52.3/t. In contrast, exports to Malaysia reached the lowest US$$ 29/t, while exports to China and Bangladesh were around US$31/t.
Bangladesh was the largest consumer of cement and clinker in Vietnam, with 4.91Mtin the first eight months (up 56 per cent YoY), worth US$153.74m. The Philippines was the second largest export market, with 3.15Mt in eight months (up 28% over the same period), worth US$ 141.2m up 23 per cent over the same period). Remarkably, cement and clinker exports to China in the first eight months of this year increased sharply, up 155% in both volume and value compared with the same period last year, although only reached 69,960 tons, equivalent to 2 , $ 17 million. In contrast, clinker cement exports to Laos, Malaysia, Mozambique and Cambodia plunged 27- 46% in both volume and value compared to the same period last year.
