Wednesday, March 30, 2022

C&EN: German chemical industry sees recession coming

In this week's Chemical and Engineering News, this article from Alex Scott: 
The German chemical industry is bracing for a recession due to surging energy prices resulting from the invasion of Ukraine and the ensuing sanctions against Russia. Natural gas prices have risen 70% since the start of the war to over $165 per MW h.

Before the war, VCI, Germany’s main chemical industry association, had forecast that the German industry would grow by 1.5% in 2022. Any forecast now “would be highly speculative,” VCI general manager Wolfgang Große Entrup told journalists at a briefing.

Russia and Ukraine account for almost 3%, or $7.5 billion, of German chemical and pharmaceutical exports, and these sales are affected by the war, the association said.

VCI recently surveyed its members, which include BASF, Evonik Industries, and Lanxess, and found that 70% have “big problems.” Some 85% say they face increasing production and procurement costs that they are able to pass on to customers only partially or not at all; 54% say they are experiencing production and sales declines.

Doesn't seem like good news - will be important to see what the repercussions will be...  

1 comment:

  1. It is not looking good for the German chemical industrie, and maybe also for the global economy. But I think this is not so relevant now, seeing what is happening in Ukraine. This article is quite eye-opening: https://www.politico.eu/article/putin-merkel-germany-scholz-foreign-policy-ukraine-war-invasion-nord-stream-2/

    ReplyDelete

looks like Blogger doesn't work with anonymous comments from Chrome browsers at the moment - works in Microsoft Edge, or from Chrome with a Blogger account - sorry! CJ 3/21/20