DURING the opening of the Tyrexpo Asia 2013 held 19 March in Singapore, a key official of the International Rubber Study Group (IRSG) predicted strong global demand for tyres through the coming decade.
Speaking as principal guest at the show, IRSG’s Secretary-General Dr Stephen Evans, said, “Following two years of disappointing economic growth, in response to the European Sovereign Debt crisis, the weak USA economic recovery and budget issues, plus the economic slowdown in China, our latest forecasts point to a period of sustained growth and strong demand for new vehicles and tyres through the coming decade.”
Evans said that a big bulk of the demand will come from China and to a lesser extent India, but from an overall perspective the years through to 2022 will be a period of opportunity for tyre makers and the replacement and service sectors.
To back his forecast, he pointed to strong growth in OE and replacement tyre sales as a result of increased vehicle production.
Moreover, he forecast that OE passenger car tyre sales will grow to 524 million units by 2022 from 333 million units in 2012. Replacement car tyre sales will be moving from 786 million units in 2012 to
1.3 billion units by 2022
According to Evans, there are currently an estimated 1.1 billion vehicles in use around the world and predict that figure will rise to as many as 1.7 billion towards the end of the coming decade. China alone is set to reach a target of an extra 250 million vehicles over the same time frame.
With around 70% of natural rubber and 50% of synthetic rubber going into tyre production, global rubber consumption is expected to follow increased tyre manufacture accordingly.
2012 consumption of 10.9 million tonnes of natural rubber for all markets (tyre and non-tyre) is forecast to grow to 17.2 million tonnes by 2022. The comparable figures for all synthetic rubber markets are
15.0 million tonnes in 2012, rising to 21.0 million tonnes by 2020.