World ceramic sanitaryware imports/exports grew by 78% from 1.6 to 2.9 million tons over the period 2005-2015, corresponding to an annual compound growth rate of 6%. The trend has remained almost constantly positive over the years, the only real downturn occurring in 2008 (-7.3%).

This however was followed by a rapid recovery in 2009 that brought levels back to above previous years’ figures. A second slowdown in 2012 was likewise followed by two years of strong expansion in exports, again however interrupted in 2015 due to the sluggishness of the world economy.

Sanitaryware exports consequently rose by just 1.1% with respect to 2014. Interestingly, the ceramic tile sector saw a similar slowdown in world import/export growth in 2015 with just a 1.5% increase over the previous year.

The 2.9 million tons of sanitaryware exports represent a significant share of the estimated world production of around 350 million pieces/year. In practice, around 40% of global output was sold outside the country of production in 2015 (compared to 29% in 2004).

The analysis of 2015 exports by geographical area of production reveals a heterogeneous trend. While Asia remained the world’s largest sanitaryware manufacturer with a 57% share of world exports, it closed the year with a 0.7% contraction against 2014 (1.67 million tons), after the previous year’s 22% growth.

This negative result did not include the three large Asian exporters (China, India and Thailand), all of which reported growth in 2015. By contrast, the European Union, the world’s second largest exporter region, further improved on its 2014 growth rate to reach 569,000 tons (+7.4%). This result was attributable to the strong performance of the five largest exporter countries in the EU, an area that boasts five of the top ten world exporter countries. Exports from North America (NAFTA region) also rose by 3.3% to reach 340,000 tons thanks to the growth of Mexico, while non-EU European countries likewise performed strongly (+4.2% to 186,000 tons) in spite of the slowdown of Turkey. By contrast, South America remained in negative territory (-12%, 72,000 tons) following four years of contraction and Africa saw its first downturn in 6 years (-5%, 84,000 tons).

Looking at the ten-year period as a whole gives a very clear picture of how exports have evolved in each region. Particularly evident is the exceptional growth of Asia, whose exports have risen from 388,000 tons in 2005 to 1.6 million tons in 2015, an overall increase of 329% (CAGR +15.7%). Asia saw its percentage share of global exports rise from 24% in 2005 to the current 57%, winning shares from all the other regions. The EU, which suffered an overall 1.4% decline with respect to the volumes exported in 2005, saw its share of world trade contract from 35.3% to 19.5%.

China remained firmly at the top of the rankings with an increase in exports from 149,000 tons in 2005 to 1.33 million tons in 2015 (+795%!), corresponding to a compound annual growth rate of 24.5%. The year-on-year increase in 2015 was 4.3%. China alone accounted for 80% of Asian exports and 45.7% of world exports.

Mexico, the second largest exporter country with a 10% share of global exports, reached 295,000 tons (up 6.7% on 2014), maintaining the upward trend of the last two years.

The only country in negative territory was third-placed Turkey, which saw a 3.7% fall to 120,000 tons. India reported the same export volumes (120,000 tons), and while remaining stable in 2015 at 2014 levels marked up the highest CAGR 2015/2005 after that of China, +9.1%.

As mentioned above, there are now five EU countries amongst the top 10 world exporters, namely Portugal, Poland and Germany (the only three of the top ten to record double-figure growth rates in 2015), followed by Italy and Bulgaria. Italy has entered the rankings following its 7% growth in exports (57,601 tons), although this figure still falls far short of the 80,000 tons of 2005.

As a result, Italy was the only country in the top ten to report a negative CAGR 2015/2005 (-3.2%), compared for example to Germany with a CAGR of +3.7% over the same period (the best performance in Europe).

The analysis of 2015 imports in the various continents and regions also reveals a heterogeneous trend.

With 8% growth over 2014 to 808,000 tons, North America (NAFTA) became the biggest importing region with a 27.7% share of world imports. Asia dropped to second place (27.1% of world imports) following a 6.5% fall in imports with respect to 2014 to 792,000 tons.

The European Union held a similar 27% share following 8% growth in imports to 789,000 tons. Other regions that saw growth in imports were South America (+7.4%) and Oceania (+12.8%), while Africa (-5.3%) and non-EU European countries (-27.8%) suffered declines.

Observing the import trends in each region over the period 2005-2015, we find that the highest percentage variation was in Africa with growth in volumes from 56,000 to 234,000 tons (+319%, CAGR 2015/2005 +15.4%). Asia achieved similarly strong growth (+234% on 2005, CAGR +12.8%), as did South America (from 60,000 to 146,000 tons, +142%, CAGR +9.2%) and Oceania (from 20,000 to 60,000 tons, +195%, CAGR +11.4%).

The first eight countries amongst the top 10 sanitaryware importers in 2015 maintained their positions with respect to the previous year. Seven of the ten countries saw an increase in exports with respect to 2014, in several cases with double-digit growth. In 2015, the imports of the top 10 importers made up 55% of world sanitaryware imports, a share that has remained virtually unchanged since 2005.

The United States remained the world’s biggest sanitaryware importer in 2015 at 682,000 tons (up 9.5% on 2014). The USA accounted for 23.4% of world imports, well ahead of all other importer countries, as well as almost all (86%) of imports to the NAFTA region. This is a longstanding record considering that in 2005 the USA imported 463,000 tons, 28% of world imports.

The UK and Germany, in second and third positions, imported respectively 145,000 tons (up 5.3% on 2014) and 142,000 tons (+10.8%) in 2015.

Both have maintained a 5% share of global imports and have seen a similar growth trend over the last decade (UK’s CAGR 2015/2005 +4.8%; Germany’s +5.8%).

The fourth largest importer in the world and the biggest in Asia is North Korea, which imported 132,000 tons in 2015 (+14% on 2014), confirming its position as one of the countries with the highest annual growth rates in imports over the period 2005-2015 (+25%). By contrast, import volumes fell in 2015 in Canada (104,000 tons, -5% on 2014) and France (102,000 tons, -2.2%), the latter seeing a contraction since 2012. Spain on the other hand reported import growth for the second year running to reach 88,000 tons in 2015 (+6.6% on 2014). Saudi Arabia saw strong growth (+17% on 2014), as did Singapore (+23%), while Nigeria suffered a slight contraction (-3.7%). Singapore and Nigeria, both of which entered the rankings of top 10 importers for the first time in 2015, did not open their markets to international trade until the last decade (imports were virtually non-existent in 2005), since when they have maintained average annual compound growth rates of more than 30%.

Edited from Tile International