PRAGUE (ICIS news)--Polyolefins consumption in central, eastern and southeastern Europe remains far behind the consumption rate in western Europe, Hungarian oil, gas and petrochemicals group MOL said on Tuesday.
Annual per capita demand for polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP) in Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary was only 21.3kg/year, 40kg/year, 24.3kg/year and 37.6kg/year, respectively, MOL said.
In Bosnia & Herzegovina, Croatia and Serbia combined, the figure was 9.5kg/year, Bulgaria was at 12.9kg/year and Romania 7kg/year. Ukraine''s per capita demand per capita was as low as 3.7kg/year.
MOL''s latest figures showed that PE and PP per capita demand in western Europe was 56.5kg/year.
MOL said that in terms of responding to the market opportunities, its "proximity to rapid growth regions of [these regions] is a significant competitive advantage."
"Our objective is to leverage our established position in the domestic and [these regional] markets," it added.
"We intend to strengthen traditional niche market positions in Western European markets and simultaneously develop our presence in the strategic eastern growth markets."
Looking at likely growth rates in the polyolefins market with the lowest current demand, Ukraine, it forecast that there would be an average annual growth rate between 2006-2010 of 6.7% for PE and 5.6% for PP.
MOL added it aimed to "fully respond" to the increasing low density PE (LDPE) deficit in the central and eastern Europe (CEE) region in the coming years.
