The plastics and rubber machinery industry maintains a positive outlook for the second half of this year, despite falling sales in the first half, the Taiwan Association of Machinery Industry (臺灣機械工業同業公會, TAMI) said yesterday.
“Last year was a tough year for the industry. The export value of the local plastics and rubber machinery industry decreased by 10.7 percent to US$1.12 billion from the previous year,” TAMI’s plastics and rubber machinery committee chairman Alan Wang (王俊賢) said at the opening of the Taipei International Plastics and Rubber Industry Show (Taipei PLAS).
The industry’s export value in the January-to-May period dropped 8.7 percent from a year earlier to US$411 million, TAMI data showed.
“However, the sales outlook for the second half is expected to be much better than the first half, considering the orders machinery manufacturers have received so far,” Wang said.
Despite the unstable global environment, an anticipated recovery by year’s end would lift the whole-year sales of the industry, he said, adding that there are new sales drivers from some emerging markets, such as Vietnam, Turkey and Mexico.
Vietnam is the second-largest importer of Taiwan’s plastics and rubber machinery products after China, Wang said.
Last year, shipments to Vietnam rose by 13.8 percent from the previous year to US$122.5 million, while shipments to China fell by 37.1 percent to US$222.9 million, TAMI data showed.
Taiwan is the sixth-largest exporter of plastic and rubber machinery products in the world, with major products including injection molding machines, extrusion machines and blow machines, data showed.
Local manufacturers sell their products mainly around Asia, which accounts for about 60 percent of total shipments, data showed.
TAMI president Wang Cheng-ching (王正青) said Taiwanese manufacturers should develop all-electric molding machines to keep up with the global trends.
“Global clients now prefer machines with higher energy efficiency. In 10 years, all-electric injection molding machines are expected to be widely used in high-tech companies,” he said.
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