Global Perspective: Focus On Russian Nonwovens Market

As we all know, to judge the market size of a product in a country, we should know the production, import and export volume of the product. The difficulty of evaluating the market scale of Russian nonwovens lies in the fact that according to the official statistics of Russia, the production of nonwovens is in square meters, while the import and export volumes are in kilotons.

According to the report of the Russian National Bureau of statistics, in 2021, Russia's output of nonwovens (except felt) will reach 6.027 billion square meters, an increase of 10.5% compared with 5.453 billion square meters in 2020 (Figure 1). If we refer to other statistics, the output of Russian nonwovens and their finished products (except clothing) in 2021 will be 7.440 billion square meters. Among them, 82% of nonwovens are produced in the central region (with Moscow as the center), 14% in Volga, 1.9% in Northwest China and 1.1% in Urals, and less than 1% in other regions.

Figure 1 Russian nonwovens (excluding felt) production from 2010 to 2021

According to the report of the Federal Customs administration, the import volume of Russian nonwovens from January to November 2021 is 97900 tons, with a year-on-year increase of 9.7% (Fig. 2). The largest source countries of Russian nonwovens imports are China and Belarus, which account for 39.4% and 21.8% of Russia's total nonwovens imports, respectively (Table 1).

Figure 2: Russia's imports and exports of Nonwovens in 2017-2021

Note: the import and export volume of 2021 in this figure and figure 3 and Figure 4 are forecast based on the data of the first 11 months of 2021

Table 1 Russian nonwovens imports from January to November 2021

In the first 11 months of 2021, Russia's nonwovens export volume was 29800 tons, a year-on-year decrease of 17.5%. Kazakhstan, Belarus and Ukraine are the main export target countries, accounting for 25.9%, 18.1% and 13% of Russia's total nonwovens exports, respectively (Table 2).

Table 2 Russian nonwovens export volume from January to November 2021

In order to understand the market situation of nonwovens, it is necessary to pay attention to the following indexes: output, import and export of synthetic and man-made fibers used for nonwovens production. From January to November 2021, the import volume of Russian synthetic fiber is up to 160400 tons, with a year-on-year increase of 27.8%. The largest import sources are Belarus, China, South Korea and Uzbekistan (Table 3).

Table 3: Russia's imports of synthetic fibers from January to November 2021

From January to November 2021, Russia's export volume of synthetic fiber is 8800 tons, with a year-on-year increase of 52.1%. Russia's main buyers of synthetic fibers are Belarus (accounting for more than half of Russia's total exports of synthetic fibers) and Kazakhstan (accounting for nearly 1 / 4 of Russia's total exports of synthetic fibers) (Table 4). At present, Russia's domestic production statistics of synthetic fiber in 2021 have not been released. The data from 2017 to 2020 are shown in Figure 3.

Table 4 Russia's export volume of synthetic fiber from January to November 2021

Figure 3 Russian synthetic fiber production, import and export in 2017-2021

Note: production data include tow, import and export data do not include tow.

From January to November 2021, Russia's import volume of man-made fiber is 20400 tons, a year-on-year decrease of 6.4%. Man made fibers are mainly imported from China, Indonesia, India and Austria (Table 5). Russia's exports of man-made fibers are extremely low, with the figure of 009200 tons in 2021. The production data of man-made fibers made in Russia in 2021 has not been released yet. The data for 2017-2020 are shown in Figure 4.

Table 5 Russian imports of man-made fibers from January to November 2021

Figure 4: Russia's import and production of man-made fibers in 2017-2021

Note: production data include tow

About the author:

Mikhail brusanov, graduated from Moscow Textile Institute, majored in textile technology and proficient in Chinese. He has been engaged in nonwovens production since 2012. At present, he is a technical engineer in montem nonwovens company in Moscow. He is also a part-time editor of polymer materials magazine in Russia, responsible for the section of nonwovens.

(source: China Industrial Textiles Association)