Leading plastics industry consultant, AMI, has just published the ninth edition of its Guide to The Polyethylene Film Extrusion Industry in Europe.
As can be expected with recession hitting Europe in 2008, the PE film extrusion industry took a downturn. Between 2007 and 2009 PE film production fell by 1 million tons. About half of this lost volume was recovered during 2010 and the industry continues to make steady progress in 2011.
According to the guide of AMI, the distribution of PE film production in Europe has not radically changed; Italy still has the largest amount of PE film production with Germany a close second. As the industry moves out of recession AMI forecasts that production will move in line with underlying GDP growth for Europe. An annual average growth of around 2-3%/year would result in an industry processing over 8.7 million tonnes by 2015.