Qeshm Cement Company has readied its first consignment of cement and clinker for exports to Mozambique, Hormoz Amiri, an official with Qeshm Free Zone, said.
The loading of 47,000 tons of clinker and 3,000 tons of cement worth $1.15 million will take up to a week, before it is shipped to Mozambique on the bulk carrier Amber Alena, Bourse Press reported.
According to Qeshm Cement Company’s public relations, the shipment is to take place under a free on board trade agreement whereby the seller is obligated to deliver the goods to a destination for transfer to a carrier designated by the buyer. The location designated in the agreement is the point at which ownership is transferred from the seller to the buyer.
Amiri noted that Qeshm Free Zone plans to export a total of 200,000 tons of cement and clinker valued at $4.5 million to Africa by the end of the current fiscal year (March 20, 2018).
The Iranian cement industry boasts an output capacity of about 90 million tons, only 56% of which are consumed in the local market and the rest is left unused. Exports stand at a maximum of 7-8 million tons per year and in the best-case scenario at 10 million tons this year, according to a member of Cement Employers Association’s board of directors, Morteza Lotfi.
Cement producers see exports as the only way out of the stagnated local market, but they are barred from their traditional markets such as Iraq and have to focus on new destinations like Africa. The government agreed a year ago to help them with the high cost of transportation by allocating 10 trillion rials ($263 million) in subsidies to exporters.
