COMMENT: The hollow core of Uganda’s cement industry

Building on Lies: We’re told Uganda produced over 4.6 million tonnes of cement in 2022. That the industry is thriving. That it deserves tax holidays, subsidies, and the status of a strategic investor. But if you take a closer look, it’s a hoax.

COMMENT | APOLLO BUREGYEYA |  I have been reading the 2023 Uganda Statistical Abstract, and something stinks beneath all that so-called “cement production”. We’re told Uganda produced over 4.6 million tonnes of cement in 2022. That the industry is thriving. That it deserves tax holidays, subsidies, and the status of a strategic investor. But if you take a closer look, the numbers betray a very different truth. It’s a hoax. A beautifully packaged industrial lie, dressed in large buildings.

According to Section 3.2.2 and Table 3.3 of the Statistical Abstract (CLICK HERE TO READ), Uganda produced over 4.6 million tonnes of cement in 2022 and consumed about 4.1 million tonnes. But flip the pages to Table 3.15 and look at the actual mineral production. Limestone, the primary raw material for cement, w2023-Statistical-Abstract_compressedas mined at just 557,319 tonnes in 2022. Compare that to 942,000 tonnes in 2019. We are not just in decline. We are delusional.

Basic cement chemistry tells you that producing one tonne of cement requires roughly one tonne of limestone.

The reduction in volume during calcination is compensated by added mineral components like pozzolana and kaolin. So if we mined just over half a million tonnes of limestone, where did the remaining 4 million tonnes come from to support our supposed cement output?

Here’s the uncomfortable answer: it was imported. Either as clinker or fully finished cement.

And what’s worse? Clinker (millions of tonnes of it) is not even mentioned in the entire 2023 Statistical Abstract.

The silence is telling. We are running grinding and bagging plants, not factories. These companies are importing foreign value, repackaging it in Ugandan bags, calling it “local production”, and conveniently disappearing from our own national statistics.

And we reward them for it. With land. With tax exemptions. With subsidised electricity. With priority in public procurement. All in the name of “Buy Uganda, Build Uganda”. But what exactly is Ugandan about a sector that doesn’t mine Ugandan minerals?

Even kaolin, another critical ingredient, dropped from nearly 7,000 tonnes in 2021 to just 226 tonnes in 2022. And yet, cement production kept rising. The math doesn’t lie. Someone else is.

Basic cement chemistry tells you that producing one tonne of cement requires roughly one tonne of limestone. So if we mined just over half a million tonnes of limestone, where did the remaining 4 million tonnes come from? Here’s the uncomfortable answer: it was imported. Either as clinker or fully finished cement

Meanwhile, our roads, dams, and megastructures are being built using imported inputs. Our public infrastructure budgets are stimulating foreign economies while we congratulate ourselves for industrializing.

The real tragedy is that the limestone beneath our feet remains untouched. No jobs at the quarries. No beneficiation. No forward linkages. Just a cargo economy disguised as industry.

Let’s call it what it is. A sector built on deception, not development. If you’re not mining Ugandan minerals and adding value, then you don’t deserve patriotic incentives. You deserve scrutiny, audits, and perhaps a quiet removal from the list of strategic sectors.

Until we see real limestone, Uganda’s cement industry remains a powdered illusion.

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The writer is an engineer, entrepreneur and industrialist. THIS COMMENT WAS ADAPTED FROM X @ApolloBuregyeya