Gypsum industry news

Bosnia and Herzegovina: State-owned power company RiTE Ugljevik has agreed to supply 250,000t/yr of gypsum for Beijing New Building Materials (BNBM)’s upcoming Ugljevik gypsum wallboard plant in Semberija Region. The power supplier produced 300,000t of flue gas desulphurisation (FGD) gypsum in 2022.

New Zealand: Revenue from Fletcher Building’s Building Products division rose by 9% year-on-year to US$514m in the first half to 31 December 2021 from US$471m in the same period in 2020. Earnings before interest and taxation (EBIT) fell by 6% to US$68.6m from US$64.6m. The building materials producer, distributor and construction company blamed the declining earnings on a coronavirus-related lockdown in the summer of 2021, although it noted improved performance in the following quarter. Overall group revenue and earnings grew in the reporting period.

“With improved operational performance and cost disciplines now embedded across the business, we were able to deliver a strong performance. This was despite the first quarter being heavily impacted by the up to five week-long Covid-19 stringent lockdown in New Zealand and local lockdowns in Australia which impacted EBIT,” said Fletcher Building’s chief executive officer Ross Taylor.

Fletcher Building’s subsidiary Winstone Wallboards is currently building a new 10Mm²/yr gypsum wallboard plant at Tauriko near Auckland. Commissioning is planned for the group’s 2023 financial year that starts in June 2023. Once completed the company says it will have a total national wallboard production capacity of 40Mm²/yr.

New Zealand: Winstone Wallboards has decided to move to an allocation model of supplying its GIB plasterboard products from July 2022 due to mounting lead times in manufacture. It said it would, effective immediately, not be accepting or processing new GIB plasterboard orders for July 2022 deliveries onwards. Instead it plans to assess the situation in the coming months and it anticipates moving to a process where customers order plasterboard products one month in advance.

The gypsum wallboard producer blamed the situation on significant disruption across the building industry caused by local-coronavirus-related lockdowns in August and September 2021. It said that this caused a backlog of orders. Subsequent record manufacturing output and imports were insufficient to alleviate the situation.

Japan: Yoshino Gypsum will celebrate the 100th anniversary of its Tiger brand of gypsum wallboard on 1 March 2022. The company was originally founded in 1901 when it started mining gypsum at the Yoshino Mine in Yamagata Prefecture. It later started to sell its first gypsum board product with the Tiger brand in 1922.

US: GMS’ net sales rose by 36% year-on-year to US$2.19bn in the six months to 31 October 2021 from US$1.62bn in the same period in 2020. Its adjusted earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) grew by 68% to US$278m from US$166m. Wallboard sales represented 37% of the net sales total at US$805m, a decrease in share from 41% at US$659m in the same period in 2020.

“Supply chain dynamics have led to all-time high levels of product inflation, which have been the principal driver of both sales growth and incremental profitability. That said, our relentless focus on customer service and the solid execution of our strategic priorities have enabled us to capture the benefits of both this heightened product inflation across our portfolio as well as continued strength in the residential market,” said John C Turner Jr, president and chief executive officer of GMS.

GMS distributes gypsum wallboard, ceiling, steel framing and complementary construction products in the US