Cemex president and CEO, Ignacio "Nacho" Mijares, says Cemex's cement plants in plants in Antipolo and Cebu are having to work 24/7, in maximum capacity, to meet the market demand in the Philippines. The government’s PHP8trn (US$150.3bn) infrastructure programme is sending cement demand upward.

"We recently were able to 'debottleneck' our dispatch which allows us to increase to half a million tons, the amount we can provide to the market. Going forward we will continue looking for the debottlenecking opportunities to be able to catch up with the market growth," Mr Mijares said.

Cemex is set to spend PHP3bn (US$56.3m) this year to build an additional 1.5Mta cement production line that will bring the total capacity of its Antipolo plant to 3.4Mta to cope with the additional cement demand. Mr Mijares added the industry demand is growing 8 to 10 per cent, higher than the country's average six per cent GDP growth.

"There’s a huge demand and potential in the country for the following years. There's a lot to be built not only in the next five years but we see the next 15, 20 years we’ll have a lot of activity," he said.

"This is one of the highest growing countries in terms of construction in the world and we're doing this to catch up to be able to continue serving the Philippines with the highest quality products," he added.

The Philippines is Cemex's third biggest market next to Mexico and the USA.