'Speciality chemicals to lead the way' – Industry leaders

13 Jun '09

2 min read

New production ethylene capacities are being set up across the globe and by 2015; ethylene production is expected to reach 160 million tons per year against a demand of 110 million tons seen in 2008. This is expected to create a glut of ethylene since ethylene supplies will outstrip demand by a very wide margin. In an exclusive interview with petrochemical industry leaders, Fibre2fashion tried to get answers to, as to how the companies would tackle the glut.

First we spoke to Mr. Rahul Kim, Sales Manager of Overseas Team at LG Chemicals, who said, “There is expansion in areas such as Russia, China, Middle East, etc and they are making same products at low cost, which leads the commercial market to dominate commodity market and the only way to survive in near future is to find new customers, new market etc. and shift our limited capacity from commodity to speciality chemicals”.

Next we spoke to an official spokesperson of Shell Chemicals, who though has a policy of not commenting on supply and demand trends, said that, “Like many industry sectors, the global economic slowdown will impact the petrochemicals sector. Reduced consumer demand for end products will mean reduced demand for bulk petrochemicals; however, as part of a well capitalised, integrated oil and gas group, Shell Chemicals continues to invest today and in the long-term in developing petrochemicals cracking capacity in markets where demand for our products is strong”.

Fibre2fashion News Desk - India

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