Hi!

I am looking for the main countries that import cement / clinker
(roughly speaking clinker is what comes out of a cement furnace. It is
then ground and becomes cement).

There are 2 ways to answer the question:
- The OK way: Provide me with a list with the 5-7 countries that are
the largest importers of cement / clinker (the US is one of them)
- The brownie point way: Provide me with statistics on how many tonnes
of cement and how many tonnes of clinker each of the 5-7 major
importing countries imports in one year (not bothered with which year
as long as it is after 1999)

Many thanks in advance for your help!

China had made 834 million tons of cement by the end of November last
year and exported 7.04 million tons by the end of 2004. The 32.11
percent and 34.28 percent increase in export volume and value
respectively is robust following a nosedive in 2002 and a slight
recovery in 2003.

41.68 percent of the exports are from Shandong province. Foreign
funded producers contribute 40 percent of China's total cement export
and their products are also sold in the domestic market.

South Korea is the largest buyer of Chinese cement, followed by the
US. Exports to South Korea, Angola and Macao all upsurged from more
than 100 percent to more nearly 250 percent. The most staggering rise
takes place in export to United Arab Emirates which has skyrocketed to
122489.26 percent.