In 2012, Saudi Arabia was the main supplier of HDPE both to China and Turkey. Iran followed Saudi Arabia, standing in the second place among the largest suppliers of Turkey and in the third place for China.
In the first five months of 2013, ChemOrbis Import Statistics reveal that Iran nearly caught up with Saudi Arabia’s contribution to Turkey’s HDPE imports while Iran overtook South Korea in China’s HDPE imports, although South Korea was the second largest import supplier in China in 2012, and narrowed the gap between itself and the number one import supplier, Saudi Arabia.
In Turkey, total HDPE imports from Iran were above 154,000 tons last year while Saudi Arabia had a larger market share with more than 181,000 tons of imports. When looking at the first five months of this year, Iran exported more than 59,000 tons of HDPE to Turkey, getting very close to Saudi Arabia, for which, a little more than 60,000 tons of HDPE imports were reported, according to Import Statistics.
Looking at China, Iranian HDPE imports were around 645,000 tons in total in 2012, surpassed by South Korea with 651,000 tons while Saudi Arabia had the largest stake in the country’s imports with more than 702,000 tons. When it comes to the first five months of this year, Iran left South Korea behind with almost 301,000 tons of HDPE imports to China. Iran’s growing market share in China’s HDPE imports was visible in that the difference between Iran and Saudi Arabia has narrowed as Saudi Arabia exported more than 350,000 tons of HDPE to China in the first five months of 2013.
According to ChemOrbis, overall May imports increased both in China and Turkey, meanwhile. Turkey’s polymer imports were up by 22% month over month while China’s May imports saw an increase of 12% over April.
