The battle for cement

Angjelos  Kalogerakos, administrator of the company, explained that this is a maneuver of prices.

“The Italian producers that export to cement from Italy and Greece to Albania, are selling their cement under cost, for not allowing their production capacity to fall under 50%, due to the crisis. If their capacity would fall, they would lose the carbon emission rights and would lose millions of EUR. Since their market has shrank, they are pressuring Albania with unjust prices”, declared Angelos Kalogerakos, administrator of Antea.

He added that the company addressed to the Albanian Ministry of Economy for an intervention, in order to improve this situation by increasing the import fees.

“Section 10 of law 9790 for the import protection, which respects the free trade agreements, grants us this right. The customs fees must be high enough for cement products so that imports don’t take from the domestic share”, the Administrator declared.

According to Antea, the losses due to the under cost competition have reached 20 million EUR annually and have brought the domestic capacity exploitation only 33%.

The company leaders declared that the government must intervene and give clear messages that the local investors are being protected, while the budget profits will be bigger.

60% of the Antea shares belong to “Titane” company, 30% to the International Financial Corporation, branch of the World Bank, and 10% of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.

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