Chemicals to lead recovery
15 Jan 2000
The UK chemicals sector will be the fastest-growing of the manufacturing industry and will spearhead an industrial recovery, claims a new economic report. The sector is one of the few to have adjusted successfully to the strength of sterling, it says.
According to the report, from economic forecaster the National Institute of Economic and Social Research, chemicals output is set to grow by 6 per cent in each of the next two years, with much of the output going to satisfy overseas demand. This pulls average growth for the manufacturing sector up to 1.5 per cent a year, it adds.
The performance is a vindication of the industry's cost-cutting and job cuts over the past two years, says NIESR, but it adds that costs must still be kept under pressure. The food and textiles industries will continue to suffer hard times for the next couple of years, it concludes.
* CEFIC's economic forecast for the coming year suggests that the European industry will grow by 2.5 per cent this year and by 3.5 per cent next year, with the strongest performances coming from France and Germany. Confidence within the chemicals sector has increased during 1999, and order books and inventory levels are now back to normal, CEFIC says.
