OREANDA-NEWS  On 13 October was announced, that Mikhail Skorokhod, the President of EUROCEMENT group holding, paid a working visit to the enterprises of EUROCEMENT group - Ukraine.

The holding President visited the Kramatorsky cement plant-Pushka in the Donetsk region and JSC Balcem in the Kharkov region. During the meeting with the management and experts of the plants the current issues of the production activities and prospects of the further socioeconomic development of the enterprises were discussed.

Mr. Skorokhod also held a meeting with Demis Galchev, his Kiev counterpart, and noted a positive dynamics in the development of the Ukrainian cement industry: since 2005 large amounts of money have been invested in the programs of production upgrade and environment protection, work at improving the working conditions and medical care of the employees has been done.

The actual expenses on the technical upgrade program for the Kramatorsky cement plant - Pushka from January 2005 to September 2008 equaled 7,5 million US dollars. The expenses on the environment protection measures implemented in the above-stated period amounted to 1,2 million US dollars.

JSC Balcem is remarkable for high production factors, it's the largest cement producer in the region and in Europe. More than 20% of Ukrainian cement is produced in the plant "Balcem". The plant plans to produce more than 3 million tons of cement and more than 2,8 million tons of clinker by the end of the year.

The investments in Balcem have increased by 10 times since 2005 and equal 27 million US dollars. 16 million US dollars was spent on the production upgrade, and approximately 4 million US dollars was invested in the infrastructure development. The total expenses on the social programs in 2008 increased by 35% in comparison with 2007.

During the working visit Mikhail Skorokhod stressed that the reconstruction of the fifth production line in Balcem had been the right tactical decision, enabling to increase the production capacity considerably and improve the cement quality significantly.

The investment program implemented in the plant allowed JSC Balcem to become the leader of the Ukrainian cement industry and take an appropriate position among the plants of the international holding EUROCEMENT group.