Chandan Kishore Kant / Mumbai July 18, 2008, 0:36 IST Step will help ensure a balance between demand and supply ACC, UltraTech Cement and other Indian cement makers may cut capacity utilisation by as much as 8 per cent in the financial year ending March 2008 as demand slows and new capacities are added, industry experts and analysts said. "Demand growth will not be as much as it was earlier as core sectors are registering a slowdown. In FY09, the average capacity utilisation of the domestic cement industry will slip to 87 per cent from 95 per cent during the last year," H M Bangur, president of the Cement Manufacturers' Association (CMA) and managing director of Shree Cement, said. "Industry's capacity is enough now.'' CMA in its latest report has said that the industry added 30.34 million tonnes of additional capacities during the last financial year instead of 22.24 million tonnes as estimated earlier. This made the industry meet the target set by the report of the working group on cement industry for the eleventh five year plan (2007-12) from the Ministry of Commerce and Industry. However, in a changing economic scenario with GDP growth rate being seen at 7.5 or below, industry experts said that cement firms will be in trouble with excess of capacities and relatively lesser demand. A city-based analyst, who did not wish to be named, said that in the following year (FY10) the capacity utilisation may further dip to 78 per cent. "No company will produce cement only to dump it in a less demanding market. Out of the announced capacities in the next two years, we expect around 55-60 million tonnes to come on stream," he added. Moreover, on the exports front too, West Asia