Mexican company Comercio para el Desarrollo Mexicano (CMD), associated with the Spanish company Tradeland Commodities, complained on July 22, 2004, that Mexican cement maker Cemex bars it from importing Russian cement to Mexico. Cemex obtained a court injunction on July 14, 2004 that allowed it to block the Mary Nour ship, carrying Russian cement, at the port of Tampico, on the Mexican Atlantic coast. Mary Nour carries 27,000 Russian cement for CMD.
Cemex operates a private terminal in El Prieto, Veracruz state, also on the Atlantic coast, and for this reason the ships transporting Cemex production pass through Tampico port. The operations and manoeuvres of Mary Nour could block the operations of Cemex on Tampico port, Cemex added.
It is evident that Cemex is just afraid of the competition of Russian cement, the attorney of CMD, Alessio Robles, said. CMD aims to import between 400,000 and 500,000 tonnes of cement via the Gulf of Mexico and the similar amount via the Pacific Ocean per year to Mexico, Robles added. The cost of the Russian cement imported to Mexico will be between 5.0 and 10 per cent lower than that of Cemex.
