High rubber prices to continue in 2011
The domestic as well as global rubber prices are high due to heavy rainfall in top natural rubber producing areas of Southeast Asia like Thailand and India which may hit output for existing year. The prices have also been supported by healthy demand from tyre industry and strong imports in China.
The world’s major rubber producers Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia have been hit by heavy rains because of the La Nina phenomenon which cause drop in production. Thailand is the world largest natural rubber producer in the world followed by Indonesia, Malaysia, India, Vietnam and China are the other major producer with less than 1 million tonne produce a year.
Indian rubber supplies peak October-January, but this year un-seasonal rains have been hindering tapping. India, world 4th largest producer is likely to produce around 8,50,000 tonne of natural rubber in 2010-11, down 4.8% from the earlier estimate of 8,93,000 tonne. India consumes nearly 1 million tonne of rubber annually, split roughly halfway between the tyre and non-tyre industries. However higher production estimates for Jan-Mar next year might offset some of the production deficit of current year.
In India, the sale of vehicles—including cars, utility vehicles, trucks, buses, motorcycles and scooters—jumped an annual 26.4% in 2009-10 to 12.3 million units, data from Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM) showed.
Despite rainfall, overall global output of rubber for 2010 is estimated higher 6.6% by the Association of Natural Rubber Producing Countries (ANRPC) at 9.502 million tonne, In 2011 year, the global rubber production is supposed to rise by 4.2% to 9.898 million tonne.
Source: Auto News India
