Polish plastics packaging company Ergis Group (Warsaw; www.ergis.eu) has posted a 14.2% fall in operating profit to PLN 20.8m (EUR 4.8m) for the first half of 2016 compared with the same period last year. Net profits dropped by nearly 29% to PLN 14m, although sales were up by 1.4% to PLN 350.4m.

President Tadeusz Nowicki described the performance as satisfactory and reiterated his prior warning that the fall in profitability was expected given that Ergis was highly unlikely to repeat its second quarter 2015 results which significantly exceeded the quarterly average. He added, however, that Ergis was happy about the further rapid growth in sales of industrial packaging which it attributed to higher sales of PET tapes and multilayer stretch “nanoErgis” films.

Sales of industrial packaging, which is its major product group and includes stretch film and PET tapes, rose by 5.81% from January to June 2016. Soft PVC film and printed packaging sales grew by 8.94% and 6.45%, respectively. Ergis said raw material prices had no material bearing on its first-half performance. It noted that while plasticisers, PET and some grades of PE cost less than the year before, PVC and some LLDPE grades were more expensive.

In response to the steady growth in demand, the group has started construction of an additional production line for its multilayer “nanoErgis” film at Olawa in southwest Poland. The extra capacity is due to be available in the second half of 2017. Ergis said it expects total expenditure on the new line would not exceed PLN 36m.