In 2025, affected by the continuous bottoming of real estate investment and the decline of infrastructure investment, the demand for cement continued to decline, the contradiction between supply and demand was further intensified, coupled with the fierce market competition, the overall price of cement fluctuated and declined, but thanks to the significant decline in coal costs in the first half of the year, the price of cement was higher than that of the same period, and the industry profit was restored to a certain extent throughout the year. Looking forward to 2026, we believe that cement consumption on the demand side will continue to show a downward trend; on the supply side, under the constraints of capacity management policies, the process of excess capacity reduction will be accelerated. The rebalancing pattern of supply and demand in the industry is expected to be gradually rebuilt, cement prices are expected to rebound, and industry efficiency will continue to show a low repair trend.
First, the demand for cement: the decline in infrastructure support and the drag on real estate are still deep
. From January to November 2025, the national infrastructure investment dropped by 1.1% (narrow sense), showing a negative growth. Specifically, from January to November, cement investment in highways, which is closely related to cement demand, was 24178 170 million yuan, down 5.6% from the same period last year, while investment in railways was 753.8 billion yuan, up 5.9% from the same period last year. The growth rate of infrastructure turned negative, coupled with the large decline in transportation infrastructure, especially in highway and waterway investment, the support of infrastructure for cement demand declined.
Figure 1: Decline in infrastructure investment from January to November 2025 Figure 2: Investment
in highway, cement and railway from January to November Data source: cement big data (https://data.ccement.com/)
Real estate development. From January to November, the amount of investment in real estate development decreased by 15.9% compared with the same period last year, of which the amount of construction and installation projects decreased by 18.2%. The sharp decline in investment, especially in construction and installation projects, dragged down the consumption of cement. From the construction side, the new construction area is still in the deep decline channel, with a year-on-year decline of 20.5% from January to November; or affected by the expansion of the decline in the completed area in the year, the overall construction side is also poor, with a year-on-year decline of 9.6%.
Figure 3: Real estate development investment continues to explore Figure 4: Growth rate
of new construction and construction area from January to November Data source: cement big data (https://data.ccement.com/)
Real estate investment is still bottoming out, which is a significant drag on cement demand. In addition, infrastructure investment has rarely declined, support has been significantly weakened, and cement demand has continued to decline. It is estimated that the national cement output in 2025 will be 1.69 billion tons, down 7.5% from the same period last year, and the output will reach a new low in 16 years. On a monthly basis, the output in January-February was 170 million tons, with a year-on-year decrease of 5.7%. In March, the demand was good, and the cement output increased by 2.5% year-on-year. In April-May, the demand was not strong in the peak season, and the demand declined year-on-year. In May, the decline increased. In June, the off-peak season, many places increased the intensity of peak staggering, and the cement output continued to decline year-on-year. In July-August, the impact of high temperature weather, the decline of cement output increased; In September, the downstream recovered slowly, and the decline of output deepened; in October, there were more rainy weather, and the output dropped by 15.8%; in November, the weather turned cold, and the output continued to decline; in December, the market basically ended, and the output is expected to drop by more than 10%.
Figure 5: Decline of cement production in 2025 Figure 6: Monthly cement production
from January to December Data source: Cement Big Data (https://data.ccement.com/)
From January to December, 31 provinces (cities) It is estimated that there are 2 and 29 provinces (cities) with the increase and decrease of cement production respectively. Among the growth provinces (cities), the output of cement in Xizang and Ningxia is expected to increase by 12.24% and 0.56% respectively, and the overall demand for cement in Xizang is better mainly due to the start-up of some infrastructure projects in the region. Among the declining provinces (cities), Shaanxi, Shanxi and Fujian are expected to have a decline of more than 15%, with insufficient funds in place, sluggish downstream construction, slow recovery of demand and large decline in output. Six provinces (cities) are expected to have a decline of 10% to 15%, with relatively weak consumption; The output of Anhui, Henan, Guangdong, Hunan and other 13 places is expected to decline between 5% and 10%, basically following the national trend; Sichuan, Zhejiang, Jiangsu and other 7 provinces (cities) have also declined by different margins, and the decline is expected to be less than 5%, of which Hebei and Xinjiang are expected to decline by less than 3%, and the output decline is relatively small.
Table 1: Data source of cement output
of each province (city) in 2025: cement big data (https://data.ccement.com/)
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