FL Smidth's contract covers the supply of a vertical mill, a pre-heater, a calciner, a kiln, a clinker cooler and two cement mills. Gearboxes will be supplied by FL Smidth subsidiary MAAG Gearand raw material crushers and stores will be supplied by FL Smidth Materials Handling. The contract is scheduled to last 18 months, with the new line expected to come on stream in late 2005.

The Danish firm supplied the first production to the Hama cement plant in the 1960s. The contractor has identified the Middle East as a key target because of the current high levels of construction activity.

The new line is part of a five-year programme to modernise and expand local cement production which will see capacity rise to 8 million t/y by 2008. Syria's 10 cement companies produced about 5 million tonnes of cement and 5 million tonnes of clinker in 2002 - slightly above the combined design capacity of the companies' production lines.