New Delhi: In a bid to contain spiraling prices of the construction material, the Government may take steps to encourage cement imports, Commerce Minister Kamal Nath said on Saturday.
"We will look at encouraging import of cement," Nath told PTI in Ghaziabad.
Due to prevailing high prices in the international market, cement imports have failed to take off despite the abolition of import duty in portland cement by the Government.
"We need a 100 MT tonne capacity in the cement industry," Nath said, adding the Government wanted to see a health industry so that supply demand gap does not remain.
Nath made it clear there was no deadlock between cement industry and the Government.
Pointing out that discussions were on with the cement industry to see what more could be done, the minister said, "We would continue to urge cement companies to consider price reduction".
He said the cement industry has pledged not to increase prices for the next twelve months even if input costs increase. "For the next twelve months they would not be raising prices and that is the most important thing," he said.
Nath disagreed that due to exports there was shortage of cement and argued that exports are minimal and limited to neighbouring nations like Nepal and Bangladesh.
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