State of non-fired brick production and utilization in Viet Nam, promotion solutions suggested by enterprises
In order to better understand the state of non-fired brick (NFB) production and utilization to propose some promotion solutions, from 23 - 25 July 2019, the Consultant Team of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) led by Mrs. Maranda Bennett - International NFB specialist as Team Leader paid working visits to some NFB manufacturing enterprises in Ha Noi, Bac Ninh and Ha Nam. This is an important activity within the framework of the Project "Promotion of non-fired brick production and utilization in Viet Nam", contributing to the preparation of the Strategy on NFB market development.
The consultant team visiting production lines of Xuan Mai Concrete Co. Ltd
At Xuan Mai Concrete Co. Ltd, Mr. Nguyen Hoang Nam - Head of Laboratory & Quality Assurance Department said: The company has installed the first NFB production line in 2015, however with increasing demand of the market, the company actively invested in the second production line in 2017 and now has 6 production lines with the production capacity is 80% of designed capacity, each line produces about 300,000m2 of non-fired building materials/year.
In addition to introducing advantages in the NFB production and utilization, Mr. Nam also said about some current difficulties and challenges, especially the Government should continue to strengthen legal mechanisms to limit the exploitation of clay soil for traditional fired brick (Non-renewable soil resources), continue to improve the system of standards and technical regulations for NFB, ...
At Viglacera AAC Joint Stock Company (Viglacera Corporation - JSC), Mr. Do Anh Duc - Representative of the company introduced to the Consultant team of AAC brick and ALC panel production line having capacity as of 200,000 m³/year with technology transferred from Germany, focusing on research cooperation to use various sources of materials from wastes of electricity sector such as fly ash, slag from thermal power plants to produce aerated concrete and non-fired building material products ... This is an issue of particular concern in the face of an increasingly alarming environmental pollution situation and many energy production plants still have no optimal option for waste treatment. Also, some green materials for modern construction such as AAC bricks and ALC panels… have been introduced to the Consultant team.
The consultant team working with representative of Viglacera AAC Joint Stock Company
In addition, the Consultant team also worked with Khang Minh Brick Joint Stock Company - The leading aggregate concrete brick producer in Viet Nam. According to Mr. Nguyen Van Tiem - Production Manager: Current difficulties and obstacles of enterprises are the fierce competition from NFB products among enterprises with uneven quality, competition by lowering the price of products, also with the low price of clay bricks. This leads to NFB producers with good brand and reputation in the market no longer interested in continuing to invest and produce NFBs.
Mr. Nguyen Van Tiem - Production Manager of Khang Minh Brick Factory presenting the benefits of using NFBs as well as challenges and difficulties of NFB production and utilization
Most of the opinions of business representatives want the Government to continue to take drastic actions in implementing the promulgated mechanisms and policies, in which need to increase the clay resource tax rate; reduce VAT rate for NFB producers; reduce costs of raw materials for NFB production (Slag, fly ash from thermal power plants); better coordinate between the Central and local management agencies in the management and supervision of the quality of non-fired building materials, ... to create motivation and confidence for businesses to continue producing NFBs towards "green" construction works and projects in the coming time.
Some NFB products of visited companies:
NFB Project Management Unit.