KARACHI, Dec 6: The cement industry is facing shortage of raw material for past four days as truck owners have stopped picking up coal consignments for factories from Port Qasim while observing a strike against incidents of theft and extortion.

The supplies of coal and various raw material essential for cement production has become irregular which may hurt production and affect supplies to retail market in the coming days.

The cement industry alone consumes around 4.5 million tons of coal as raw material or alternative fuel annually and approximately 14,000-15000 tons of coal is transported daily from Port Qasim to different factories in the country, including Punjab and KPK.

The All-Pakistan Goods Transports Owners Association has intimated cement factories their limitations of providing raw material to cement manufacturers due to their protest campaign.

They said that the motorway police had imposed an impractical restriction on truck owners that could not be materialised as far as cost and benefit ratio is concerned.

The truck owners said that the motorway police had imposed load restriction of 58.500 tons, including 28 ton weight of truck itself, which would ultimately increase manifold the transportation charges per ton of coal.

They rejected the move as would immensely increase fares that would translate into increased cost of production for cement producers.

Truck owners demanded of the government to rationalise the load limit on trucks with respect to cost of fuel and labour, adding the challan on trucks drivers should be stopped immediately.

The All-Pakistan Cement Manufacturers Association (APCMA), in a statement, demanded of the government to resolve the issues of goods carrier at the earliest so that supplies are regularised to continue production of cement in factories uninterrupted.

The APCMA spokesman said if the government ignores the issue, the situation will badly hit the whole cement sector.

The interruption in production would disturb the cycle of cement supplies in the country, and the whole construction industry would suffer due to shortage of cement.