UK: Allied Custom Gypsum (ACG), a worldwide provider of gypsum products, has announced that it is now certified by the British Retail Consortium (BRC), a leading global safety and quality certification program, as compliant to Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI).

Used by more than 20,000 certified suppliers in 90 countries, the BRC is the world's largest provider of safety and quality standards programmes for food manufacturing, packaging, storage, distribution and consumer products. The BRC aids in standardising quality, safety, operational criteria and manufacturers' fulfilment of legal obligations.

"We are extremely pleased to make the announcement of our certification and become the first and only certified calcium sulphate supplier," said Jim Hill, vice president of marketing. "At ACG, we understand the responsibility inherent in processing and packaging food and pharmaceutical grade calcium sulphate. That's why we have dedicated one of our two grinding facilities to the production of food and pharmaceutical grade calcium sulphate," said Hill. "Our commitment to high-quality standards is unprecedented."

UK: Energy savings of 63% have been achieved following the installation of multiple Saint-Gobain systems in a world-first retrofit research project.

Saint-Gobain worked with the Energy House at Salford University, Greater Manchester, UK to prove that whole-house, fabric first retrofitting of homes can deliver significantly reduced energy costs, lower CO₂ emissions and remove 50% of air leakage.

The Energy House at Salford University is a typical 1919 terraced house that has been reconstructed in a fully environmentally controllable chamber, in which climatic conditions can be maintained, varied, repeated and patterns monitored. The type of building used in the study represents 21% of UK housing stock and is classed as a hard-to-treat property due to its poor energy efficiency derived from solid wall construction.

The Energy House at Salford University included Saint-Gobain systems from British Gypsum, Glassolutions, Isover and Weber to bring high levels of thermal efficiency. The approach of the project was to measure the whole-house performance post-installation using off-the-shelf Saint-Gobain systems and standard installation techniques, making the results repeatable across the UK's hard-to-treat housing stock.

US: USG Corp has reported a surge in profit for the first quarter of 2014, primarily on increased shipments and higher selling prices.

Chief executive officer James Metcalf said, "Despite the harsh winter conditions across most of the US during the first quarter of 2014, we delivered positive operating results and net income."

USG said that its US gypsum wallboard shipments rose to 1.15Bnft² (107Bnm²) from 1.11Bnft² (103Bnm²), while average wallboard prices climbed to US$166.66/1000ft² from US$153.07/1000ft² in 2013. Net sales for the first quarter of 2014 grew to US$850m, up from US$814m in the corresponding quarter of 2013. USG's first quarter profit surged to US$45m from US$2m.

Pakistan: Labourers have demanded payment of compensation to the legal heirs of their colleagues who lost their lives during work in gypsum mines in the Karak District, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

The labourers said that several workers had been killed in gypsum mines at Lakh Kani, Bahaderkhel and Narri Panos areas in the Karak District, but the families didn't receive any compensation from the Workers Welfare Board of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. They also complained that the mine owners had provided no safety equipment to the labourers. The labour leaders threatened to stage a sit-in outside of the office of the labour commissioner of Kohat if their demands were not met.