Chairman of National Board of Revenue (NBR) Abdul Karim formally launched the cement at a hotel on Thursday in Dhaka.

Specially designed and rigorously tested through stringent quality control, Supercrete is a general purpose application cement, officials told the launching ceremony.

Describing other features of the product, officials said Supercrete is a limestone-based portland composite cement with 42.5 Mpa guaranteed strength at the end of 28 days.

Lafarge Surma Cement, a venture of France's building material giant Lafarge and Cementos Molins, a top cement producer in Spain, was incorporated in 1997 and till date it has invested US $ 278 million to develop its production base.

The factory, located at Chhatak, Sylhet, is just 10 km away from the border with the Indian state of Meghalaya. It is a unique project as the raw materials will be brought from Meghalaya by a 17- kilometer belt conveyor.

Although the retail price of Supercrete was not mentioned, the inaugural function was told that its price will be reasonable as the local cement is very much competitive.

Martin Kreigner, regional president of Lafarge Group, Yongngai Chan, managing director of Lafarge Surma Cement, and K Swaminathan, commercial director of Lafarge Surma Cement, among others, spoke at the function.