From January to October, Iskitimcement produced 868,000 tons of cement, which is 1.2 % less than in ten months of last year. The decline in production volumes is partly due to a decrease in cement consumption in the Novosibirsk region: down to 1.03 million tons, which is 6.2 % less than in January-October 2019.
In 10M 2020, 871,000 tons of cement were shipped to customers, which is comparable to last year’s numbers. 346,000 tons were shipped by rail, 525,000 tons — by road. At the same time, 39 % of the volume of products shipped by road (203,000 tons) was sent to customers via the company's own cement trucks.
The enterprise sold 625,000 tons of bulk cement — 71.7 % of the total sales volume. 246,000 tons were sold in containers: 94,000 tons in one-ton big bags and 152,000 tons in paper bags of 25 and 50 kg. In January-October 2020, customers purchased 67,000 thousand tons of cement in paper bags placed on pallets, which is 44 % of all paper-bagged products. This indicator in 2019 amounted to 40,000 tons or 23.6 % of the total volume of products in paper containers.
The products of Iskitimcement are in demand in the construction of large infrastructure facilities: the multifunctional ice arena Novosibirsk Arena, the Sportivnaya subway station, and a new bridge across the Ob River.
Today, the plant's assortment of cements includes six general construction types and one special type. In the “high” construction season of 2020, the share of general construction CEM I 42.5R and CEM II/A-S 32.5R in the total production volume amounted to 52 and 31 %, respectively.
At the start of the current construction season, the plant expanded its product line by launching the production of a special Portland cement with slag CEM II/A-S 32.5R DO, intended for the manufacture of concrete for the foundations of highways and soil strengthening. 21,000 tons of CEM II/A-S 32.5R DO were sold since it became available for purchase.
Taking into account the upward trend in the consumption of finely ground high-quality rapidly setting cement, the plant has implemented a large-scale investment project to install a dynamic separator at closed-circuit cement mill No. 6. The volume of investments in the project amounted to about RUB 270 million. Now, even during the “high” construction season, the plant is ready to provide customers with separated cement, which is superior in quality characteristics to products produced via open circuit grinding. In total, 270,000 tons of separated cement have been produced since the commissioning of the new equipment. By the end of the year, Iskitimcement plans to produce and sell about 300,000 tons of such products.
During 2020, modern equipment units were installed in the Iskitimcement’s laboratory: an X-ray fluorescence spectrometer and a bench-top X-ray diffractometer. Over RUB 21 million was allocated for the purchase of new laboratory equipment.
Iskitimcement finalized repairs of primary equipment, automation of the process control systems, environmental safety projects, and production modernizations. The implementation of the investment program continues, salaries are paid on time, tax and credit obligations are fully met.
In May, the company entered into a management agreement with Sibcem, one of the largest shareholders of Iskitimcement at the time. Operating as a 100 % subsidiary of the holding allows the company to accumulate financial resources necessary for modernization, purchase of new equipment and expanding the range of manufactured building materials. Thus, the plant steadily continues to develop.
“All in all, the enterprise has every opportunity to achieve the planned annual indicators for cement grinding volumes, but we cannot seriously influence this: capacity utilization directly depends on the market needs,” comments Vladimir Skakun, Managing Director of Iskitimcement JSC. — Due to the COVID-19 pandemic and other factors, there was a general decrease in economic activity and a decrease in the income of consumers, which could not but affect the state of the construction industry. As per Rosreestr, 489,000 agreements for participation in shared construction were concluded in Russia in Jan-Sep 2020. It’s 24 % less than in the nine months of 2019. In the Siberian Federal District, the same indicator decreased from 55,000 contracts to 41,000 (-32 %). Each month of this year introduces new adjustments, so it is quite difficult to predict the volume of production and sales of cement in 2021”.
Iskitimcement is one of the leading enterprises in the cement industry in Siberia. The plant supplies cement to construction sites in the Novosibirsk Region and Altai Territory, Khanty-Mansiysk and Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Districts, Kemerovo, Omsk, Tomsk, Tyumen, Kurgan regions. Also, Iskitim’s cement is exported to Kazakhstan. Most of the plant's products are used for the construction of residential buildings, production of reinforced concrete structures, asbestos-cement products, ready-mixed concrete and dry mixtures.
