From January to June 2018, cement sales in Brazil totalled 25.4Mt, down 1.5 per cent YoY, according to preliminary data from SNIC, the country’s cement association.

Apparent consumption (domestic sales + imports) totalled 25.5Mt in the six-month period. slipping 1.9 per cent when compared with 1H17.

SNIC President, Paulo Camillo Penna, said that the results achieved in the first half were strongly influenced by the truck drivers strike: "We projected an already positive performance in the first semester, but the strike in May caused sales to halt in the last ten days of that month and, even with some recovery in June, this result was not sufficient to recover the loss and closed the May/June bimester with a fall of 3.8 per cent in relation to the same bimester of 2017. With this, the result of the semester was negative in 1.5 per cent”.

However, going forward he had expected cement sales to increase between 1-2 per cent, but weak economic activity required this projection to be revised. "Cement consumption has traditionally performed better in the second half of the year but, given the results achieved so far, along with the slowdown in the country's economic activity - experts have already reduced the projection of GDP growth to only 1.5% make the sector revise its projections and our perception is that we run the risk of closing the 4th consecutive year of decline,” Mr Penna said.