ISLAMABAD, March 7: The Monopoly Control Authority (MCA) on Wednesday constituted a committee for determination of reasons of unexpected raise in cement price during the last few weeks.

The constitution of the committee came in the wake of failure of the ministry of industries and production in pressing the cement producers to bring down the commodity price to a reasonable level.

An official announcement by the MCA said the committee will identify reasons for increase in cement price in the second half of January 2007 and early February 2007 and submit a report to the government as early as possible.

The committee, comprising two members of the authority, would be assisted by two senior officers of the MCA, chief cost accounts officer and chief research and investigation to conduct a thorough probe and submit its report.

The ministry of industries and production had given a one week deadline for bringing down the cement price, otherwise, stern action will be taken, including levy of ban on export of cement to Afghanistan and Middle East.

Neither the industry scaled down the cement price to a reasonable level, nor any action was taken, like ban on export or allowing subsidised import of commodity to benefit the end consumers.