European plastics machinery manufacturers organised in Euromap (Frankfurt / Germany; www.euromap.org) can look back on a record performance in 2017, the association’s president, Luciano Anceschi, said at the recent general assembly in Linz / Austria. Production volumes of member companies from nine European countries rose 7% against 2016. With this, output of European producers has risen since 2009 to an estimated EUR 15.3 bn. This represents an increase of 99% within only eight years, said Anceschi, who represents Tria (Cologno Monzese / Italy; www.tria.it). Last year, he noted, European growth outpaced the world average, which saw global production of this type of machinery increasing by 3.3% to EUR 36.3 bn.

There is no end to the current boom in sight, Euromap proclaimed at the meeting. Due to full order books, it forecast growth of around 2% for 2018 to a value of EUR 15.6 bn. At the same time, however, the machinery manufacturers acknowledged that the “unusually long boom phase” is “increasingly likely” to end, in part a victim of its own success. Delivery times for machinery and peripherals have lengthened considerably, and some companies are having difficulty finding sufficiently skilled workers, the association said. European producers also face threats from competitors abroad.

In an international comparison, growth at European companies is stagnating, but they are still holding their own for now while hard on their heels, China is strengthening its position. Including production plants as well as machinery, in 2017 Chinese companies had a production value of EUR 11.1 bn. Since 2009, they have improved their performance by 180 percentage points. What’s more, in 2018, the Europeans’ targeted growth of 2% could well lag the projected 3% rise in the world’s average output to a value of EUR 37.4 bn.

Led by Germany with 24.5%, Euromap was still world’s leading exporter of plastics and rubber machinery in 2017, accounting for around 50% of global exports worth EUR 23.1 bn. Its companies exported machinery worth EUR 11.3 bn, some 42% of this to customers within the European single market. China accounted for 16.4% of the export tally and Japan for 10.4%, while the US trailed with a flat 5.7%.

At the Euromap general assembly, Anceschi was confirmed as the association’s president, while Thorsten Kühlmann from the plastics and rubber group within the German association VDMA (Frankfurt; http://kug.vdma.org) was confirmed as secretary general. Michael Baumeister of Germany’s Brückner (Siegsdorf / Germany; www.brueckner.com) succeeded the retiring Karl-Heinz Bourdan of Milacron as Euromap’s vice president.