THE Caribbean Cement Company says it will be importing 40,000 tonnes of cement to make up for the current shortage.

At the same time, the company announced that it will be increasing the price of the product when supplies return to normality.

According to the company’s marketing manager, Alice Hyde, cement was the only “primary building material that has kept its costs down over the last two years” despite hikes in the cost of production largely due to the continued slide of the Jamaican dollar and rising fuel prices.

“In light of all of this, the company intends to implement a price adjustment to mitigate some of the increased costs it has faced, however, this price adjustment will not be implemented until the market returns to normal,” she said.

The company’s general manager, Anthony Haynes, in the meanwhile, said the first four shipments, totalling 16,000 tonnes are expected to arrive in the island next month and the remainder between January and February.

The initial supplies will come from Carib Cement’s sister company, Arawak Cement in Barbados, and one of its partners, the Mexico-based Cemex. He said the company was trying to identify a company to supply the remaining amount.

“This level of import will allow us to take certain key plants out of service to execute planned upgrading work on them,” Haynes told journalists yesterday at the company’s plant in Rockfort, Kingston.

“The imported cement will be sold to consumers at the existing price of Carib Cement plus,” he said, explaining that the importation costs would not be passed on to the consumers.

Yesterday, Haynes said while the company had resumed normal production following the recent flood rains, it was challenged to meet a backlog of demand which forced it to seek the outside supplies. He said the importation was also intended to “restore a safe working inventory” for the company.

Cement ran short in mid-October following several days of torrential rain which, the company said, hampered its mining and manufacturing schedules, disrupted productions and led to an eventual shortage in supplies. Production, the company said, was also affected by three days of industrial action carried out by its employees.

But the company, he said, will be prepared for similar occurrences next time around.