Muscat Daily reported that on the back of increased demand in export markets and improvement in cement prices, profits at Raysut Cement jumped 54% in the 6 month period ended June 30th 2012.

According to a company filing with the Muscat Securities Market, net profit rose to OMR 13.7 million in the H1 as compared to OMR 8.9 million last year. Raysut Group total revenue grew 17% to OMR 49.5 million in the H1 as against OMR 43.5 million in the corresponding period of last year.

Mr Sheikh Ahmed bin Alawi al Ibrahim chairman of Raysut Cement said that keeping pace with growth in the construction segment cement prices are slowly moving up and demand is on the rise in the region. But supplies in Oman are still under significant pressure on inflows from UAE, making the domestic scenario highly competitive.

However, the rise in demand from Yemen and East African markets has had a favorable impact on the company. The company has done very well with higher revenue and profit during the period by pursuing with its non traditional markets beyond its traditional base.

Raysut boosted cement production substantially by 25.2% in the H1 in order to meet the additional demand in both domestic and export markets. The sale of clinker had to be restrained to boost the sale of cement. Raysut as a whole sold over 2 million tonnes of cement and 60,121 MT of clinker during the half year.

Source - Muscat Daily

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