BEIJING, April 14 (Xinhua) -- China's building material sector saw steady growth in output and profit in the first two months of the year, official data showed.
Major building materials all reported a rise in their output. Cement output edged up 0.5 percent year on year to 210 million tones within the period, while that of flat glass and commercial concrete both saw an increase by 7.8 percent and 8.3 percent respectively, according to data from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.
The building material enterprises above designated size raked in profits of 45.1 billion yuan (about 6.7 billion U.S. dollars) in total, up 3.2 percent year on year.
Cement business profits surged 19.2 percent to stand at 13.39 billion yuan, while that of flat glass plummeted 97.9 percent to 10 million yuan due to a 6.6 percent drop in price and rising costs.
However, with flat glass suffering from a price drop, its exports witnessed a 95.1 percent jump within the period.
In January, building materials and nonmetallic mine products worth 3.29 billion dollars were exported, up 11.3 percent year on year.
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