Tamer Saka, Chair of the Board of Directors of TÜRKÇİMENTO, Appears as a Guest ın the Finans Merkezi Program

In his statement regarding the sector, Saka said, “We started 2020 with hope. We experienced a pause with the outbreak of the pandemic but we carried the sector to a better position in the second half of the year. We brought the exports from around 23 million tons to the level of 32 million tons.
Our sales volumes increased but we still continue to sell the cheapest cement in the world. There has been a serious increase in petcoke that is our significant cost item. We saw increases in many cost items of us. Regardless, we did not reflect them to our prices.

There became a period that started in mid-2018 and posed contraction on the construction and cement sector. We observed recovery in the sector as of the second half of 2020. For the time being, we do not foresee any dynamic that will increase the demand to a significant extent in 2021. We might experience a 5% growth over 2020. In addition, we might see a 50% capacity utilization on the domestic market. It appears that this pressure in the capacity utilization on the domestic market will continue.”

Specifying that it is important to reach the consumers by increasing the added value in exports, Saka added that the cement sector must turn its eyes outside from now on and that it is beneficial to make use of the options like purchasing plants or entering into partnerships.