Indonesia: cement sales up in Kalimantan

Cement sales of PT Semen Indonesia in Kalimantan rose 11.4 per cent in the period of January to April reaching 1.47Mt. The growth is the third biggest nationally, company spokesman Muhammad Helmi said to newsmen on Tuesday. "The highest sales growth is recorded in Nusa Tenggara regions by around 23.1 per cent  followed by Papua-Maluku regions by 14 per cent," he said.

He stated that the cement market in Kalimantan still has plenty of potential and continued to grow in line with increasing infrastructure development in the region. In South Kalimantan sales of PT Semen Indonesia Group (Semen Gresik and Semen Tonasa) in the January-April period also rose significantly from 108,470t to 112,770t. "We keep actively seeking new potential markets including in Kalimantan. Reaching out to construction workers is one of our marketing strategies to strengthen our market," he said on the sidelines of a training programme for construction workers across Kalimantan.

Nationally PT Semen Indonesia's sales in the January-April 2013 period reached 7.91Mt, up 19 per cent from 6.65Mt in the same period last year. PT Semen Indonesia sales are far higher than the average sales of other cement industries which grew only 8.6 per cent from 16.68Mt in the January-April 2012 period to 18.2Mt in the same period this year.

Regarding the training programme, Helmi said that it has been carried out since 2007 in 65 districts/cities in Java, Bali and Kalimantan involving 10,352 construction workers. In terms of marketing he said construction workers play an important role because they communicate directly with cement users and therefore could affect their choice.

"Construction workers play a role with their cement purchase recommendations and so cooperating with them could strengthen PT Semen Indonesia's market. The cooperation is vital to create an effective word-of-mouth marketing model," he said.