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Spain’s Tissue Paper Market – Key Statistics and Trends

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Spain’s Tissue Paper Market – Key Statistics and Trends

IndexBox has just published a new report: ‘Spain – Toilet Or Facial Tissue Stock, Towel And Similar Paper – Market Analysis, Forecast, Size, Trends and Insights’. Here is a summary of the report’s key findings.

The revenue of the tissue paper market in Spain amounted to $228M in 2018, surging by 2.6% against the previous year. This figure reflects the total revenues of producers and importers (excluding logistics costs, retail marketing costs, and retailers’ margins, which will be included in the final consumer price).

Production in Spain

In 2018, the tissue paper production in Spain amounted to 192K tonnes, declining by -16.4% against the previous year. In general, tissue paper production continues to indicate a relatively flat trend pattern. The most prominent rate of growth was recorded in 2015 with an increase of 19% year-to-year. Tissue paper production peaked at 229K tonnes in 2017, and then declined slightly in the following year.

Exports from Spain

In 2018, the amount of toilet or facial tissue stock, towel and similar paper exported from Spain stood at 70K tonnes, coming down by -12.3% against the previous year. In value terms, tissue paper exports amounted to $94M (IndexBox estimates) in 2018.

Exports by Country

France (21K tonnes), Portugal (15K tonnes) and the UK (11K tonnes) were the main destinations of tissue paper exports from Spain, together comprising 67% of total exports. These countries were followed by Italy, Belgium, Morocco and Germany, which together accounted for a further 20%.

From 2013 to 2018, the most notable rate of growth in terms of exports, amongst the main countries of destination, was attained by Italy, while exports for the other leaders experienced more modest paces of growth.

In value terms, the largest markets for tissue paper exported from Spain were France ($28M), Portugal ($17M) and the UK ($13M), with a combined 62% share of total exports. These countries were followed by Italy, Belgium, Germany and Morocco, which together accounted for a further 21%.

Export Prices by Country

The average tissue paper export price stood at $1,346 per tonne in 2018, growing by 12% against the previous year. Over the period from 2013 to 2018, it increased at an average annual rate of +1.0%. The pace of growth appeared the most rapid in 2018 an increase of 12% y-o-y. Over the period under review, the average export prices for toilet or facial tissue stock, towel and similar paper reached their peak figure at $1,368 per tonne in 2014; however, from 2015 to 2018, export prices failed to regain their momentum.

Prices varied noticeably by the country of destination; the country with the highest price was Germany ($2,821 per tonne), while the average price for exports to Italy ($1,077 per tonne) was amongst the lowest.

From 2013 to 2018, the most notable rate of growth in terms of prices was recorded for supplies to Germany, while the prices for the other major destinations experienced more modest paces of growth.

Imports into Spain

In 2018, the amount of toilet or facial tissue stock, towel and similar paper imported into Spain amounted to 68K tonnes, waning by -6.2% against the previous year.

In value terms, tissue paper imports stood at $102M (IndexBox estimates) in 2018.

Imports by Country

In 2018, Italy (28K tonnes) constituted the largest tissue paper supplier to Spain, accounting for a 41% share of total imports. Moreover, tissue paper imports from Italy exceeded the figures recorded by the second-largest supplier, Portugal (13K tonnes), twofold. France (8.5K tonnes) ranked third in terms of total imports with a 13% share.

From 2013 to 2018, the average annual growth rate of volume from Italy totaled +5.7%. The remaining supplying countries recorded the following average annual rates of imports growth: Portugal (+13.4% per year) and France (-4.5% per year).

In value terms, Italy ($40M) constituted the largest supplier of tissue paper to Spain, comprising 39% of total tissue paper imports. The second position in the ranking was occupied by Portugal ($17M), with a 17% share of total imports. It was followed by Germany, with a 14% share.

Import Prices by Country

The average tissue paper import price stood at $1,501 per tonne in 2018, surging by 5% against the previous year. Over the period under review, the tissue paper import price, however, continues to indicate a moderate contraction. The most prominent rate of growth was recorded in 2014 when the average import price increased by 9.2% year-to-year. In that year, the average import prices for toilet or facial tissue stock, towel and similar paper reached their peak level of $1,846 per tonne. From 2015 to 2018, the growth in terms of the average import prices for toilet or facial tissue stock, towel and similar paper failed to regain its momentum.

There were significant differences in the average prices amongst the major supplying countries. In 2018, the country with the highest price was Germany ($2,081 per tonne), while the price for Algeria ($999 per tonne) was amongst the lowest.

From 2013 to 2018, the most notable rate of growth in terms of prices was attained by Germany, while the prices for the other major suppliers experienced a decline.

Source: IndexBox AI Platform

toilet

TOILET PAPER: A UNIQUELY AMERICAN OBSESSION

The sight of barren grocery store shelves in the first few weeks of the coronavirus crisis sent thousands of shoppers scrambling for basic supplies – including, in the United States, toilet paper. As of April 1, bathroom tissue remained a sought-after commodity nationwide, out of stock at big-box retailers like Costco and Walmart, and even online at Amazon.

This sudden scarcity has made toilet paper as valuable as any other paper currency. Neighbors using the NextDoor app are bartering toilet paper for eggs and other household essentials, reports Bloomberg, and a recently viral Tik-Tok video showed a man tipping delivery drivers with rolls of toilet paper instead of cash. There’s even been a wave of toilet-paper-related crime. In North Carolina, for instance, sheriff’s deputies found a stolen tractor-trailer carrying 18,000 pounds of bathroom issue, while in Florida, police arrested a man for stealing 66 rolls from a Marriott hotel. A surging number of price-gouging investigations have also focused on the exploitation of desperate shoppers; some chain stores, for example, have reportedly demanded $10 a roll, along with $26 thermometers and $40 for a single pair of face masks.

Americans, however, might be unique in their fixation on toilet paper, despite reports of toilet paper panic-buying in other parts of the world. Americans are not only the world’s largest producers of toilet paper, they are also its most prolific users. In fact in many places globally, toilet paper – along with basic sanitation – is an unimaginable luxury. Toilet paper shortages, it turns out, are truly a first-world worry.

In global toilet paper usage, Americans are on a roll

According to Tissue World Magazine (yes, there is such a thing), North American consumers used an average of 25 kilograms of toilet paper per person in 2018 – or the equivalent of 144 Charmin Mega-Rolls – far outstripping the average global per capita usage of just 5 kilograms a year. By comparison, consumers in western Europe and Japan used only about 15 kilograms per person, while toilet paper usage is close to negligible in Africa, the Middle East and many parts of Asia.

Who Uses the Most Tissue

The vast bulk of the toilet paper Americans use is domestically produced. According to the market forecasting firm IndexBox, just 7.5 percent of Americans’ bathroom tissue is imported. Even so, the United States is still the world’s largest importer of toilet tissue, accounting for 9.4 percent of global imports, according to MIT Media Lab’s Observatory of Economic Complexity (OEC). China, meanwhile is the world’s largest exporter, followed by Germany, Japan, Poland and Italy. China, does not, however, export much of its toilet paper to the United States; rather, 80 percent of Chinese exports end up in other parts of Asia, Africa and Europe. What toilet paper the United States does import comes primarily from Canada and Mexico.

TP imports

Unlike with other categories of consumer goods, Americans don’t rely on foreign toilet paper because its domestic production is so strong. Among the nation’s top manufacturers are global consumer products giants such as Kimberly-Clark (maker of Cottonelle and Scott); Procter & Gamble (the maker of Charmin and creator of Mr. Whipple); and Koch Industries’ Georgia-Pacific (maker of Quilted Northern and Angel Soft). Clearwater Paper Corporation, which reportedly operates one of the world’s largest toilet paper factories in Lewiston, Idaho, is the nation’s biggest maker of store-brand toilet paper, such as for the grocery chain Kroger and for Costco. (According to the Idaho Statesman, each of the factory’s 1300 workers received 36 free rolls of toilet paper, as well as 24 rolls of paper towels, in what another local news outlet described as a “pandemic bonus.”)

Why the world isn’t flush with toilet paper

Global trade in toilet paper totaled $24.4 billion in 2018 – a relatively small figure compared to other consumer goods such as cosmetics ($44.5 billion), shoes ($99.6 billion) or refrigerators ($43.1 billion). International trade accounts for about 22 percent of global tissue consumption, according to one market analysis.

One reason that toilet paper-dependent countries like the United States rely on domestic production is that it’s the cheapest option. The United States, for instance, has plentiful supplies of both virgin and recycled wood pulp, which are the raw materials for toilet paper. And because of its bulk, toilet paper is also expensive to transport, which means that foreign toilet paper would be more costly by comparison – at least as a finished product. In fact, more than a third of the global trade in toilet paper is in so-called “parent rolls” of tissue – giant rolls that are converted by paper mills into smaller rolls and then packaged into the plastic-wrapped six-packs you would (normally) find on the shelf.

But there are other reasons why there is no vast global market for toilet paper, despite the central role it seemingly plays in Americans’ everyday lives. One is the popularity of bidets in many parts of the industrialized world, including in Europe and especially in Asia. As Tissue World Magazine points out, today’s high-tech bidets are stiff competition for low-tech toilet paper. In Japan, for instance, “high-tech toilets based on water and/or air jetting with several additional functions, including automatic lid opening, music, ozone deodorant systems and urinalysis, seem to have had some negative impact on toilet tissue consumption.” Among the most popular of these luxury bidets is the Washlet “personal cleaning system,” manufactured by Japan’s TOTO. In October 2019, the company celebrated its 50 millionth sale of the Washlet.

Bidets are potentially even catching on in the United States – perhaps in part to the current toilet paper panic as well-heeled consumers look for ways to do without toilet paper altogether. Wired, for example, recently reported a spike in Americans’ interest in bidets, including a deluge of calls to domestic bidet manufacturing startup Tushy. “This could be the tipping point that finally gets Americans to adopt the bidet,” CEO Jason Ojalvo told the magazine.

But perhaps the most significant reason the rest of the world doesn’t share Americans’ attachment to toilet paper is that this most basic of human rights – access to sanitation – does not exist in vast swathes of the globe. Not only is toilet paper unavailable, so are toilets.

A global crisis in sanitation

According to the United Nations, more than half the global population – 4.2 billion people – live without access to “safely managed” sanitation, which the UN defines as access to a “hygienic, private toilet that safely disposes of people’s waste.” As many as 673 million resort to “open defecation,” which contributes enormously to the transmission of disease. More than 2 billion people drink water contaminated by feces, the UN further reports.

One tragic result is that 432,000 people die each year from diarrheal diseases as a result of inadequate sanitation, according to the UN, including 297,000 children under the age of five. According to Rose George, author of The Big Necessity: The Unmentionable World of Human Waste and Why It Matters, diarrhea kills a child every 15 seconds. In contrast, she writes, “Modern sanitation has added 20 years to the average human life.”

Unfortunately, just 40 out of 152 countries that have pledged to provide universal sanitation by 2030 are on track to reach this goal, the result of funding shortfalls, increasing water pollution, poor governance and conflict. The current global crisis with COVID-19, certain to ravage the developing world, will set back this progress even more. In fact, the lack of sanitation – including access to clean water for hand hygiene – could accelerate the spread of disease in many parts of the world, adding to the pandemic’s already shocking human toll.

While it’s only a matter of time before U.S. grocery store shelves are stocked again with what Americans consider the most basic of staples, many more nations have far to go before they can experience the luxury of that deprivation.

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Anne Kim is a contributing editor to Washington Monthly and the author of Abandoned: America’s Lost Youth and the Crisis of Disconnection, forthcoming in 2020 from the New Press. Her writings on economic opportunity, social policy, and higher education have appeared in numerous national outlets, including the Washington Monthly, the Washington Post, Governing and Atlantic.com, among others. She is a veteran of the think tanks the Progressive Policy Institute and Third Way as well as of Capitol Hill, where she worked for Rep. Jim Cooper (D-TN). Anne has a law degree from Duke University and a bachelor’s in journalism from the University of Missouri-Columbia.

This article originally appeared on TradeVistas.org. Republished with permission.

toilet paper

Global Toilet Paper Market – U.S. ($375M), Germany ($320M), and the Netherlands ($164M) Are the Biggest Importers

IndexBox has just published a new report: ‘World – Toilet Paper – Market Analysis, Forecast, Size, Trends And Insights’. Here is a summary of the report’s key findings.

The global toilet paper market revenue amounted to $60.4B in 2018, going up by 6.6% against the previous year. This figure reflects the total revenues of producers and importers (excluding logistics costs, retail marketing costs, and retailers’ margins, which will be included in the final consumer price).

The market value increased at an average annual rate of +2.9% over the period from 2007 to 2018; the trend pattern remained relatively stable, with only minor fluctuations being observed throughout the analyzed period. The growth pace was the most rapid in 2008 with an increase of 12% year-to-year. The global toilet paper consumption peaked in 2018 and is expected to retain its growth in the immediate term.

Exports 2007-2018

In 2018, approx. 2.1M tonnes of toilet paper were exported worldwide; going up by 4.9% against the previous year. Over the period under review, toilet paper exports continue to indicate a relatively flat trend pattern. The most prominent rate of growth was recorded in 2010 when exports increased by 5.3% against the previous year. Over the period under review, global toilet paper exports reached their peak figure in 2018 and are expected to retain its growth in the near future.

In value terms, toilet paper exports totaled $3.7B (IndexBox estimates) in 2018.

Exports by Country

China (229K tonnes) and Germany (222K tonnes) represented the main exporters of toilet paper in 2018, finishing at approx. 11% and 11% of total exports, respectively. It was followed by Italy (127K tonnes), France (113K tonnes), Poland (109K tonnes) and Sweden (104K tonnes), together comprising a 21% share of total exports. Canada (84K tonnes), El Salvador (80K tonnes), Mexico (73K tonnes), Slovakia (73K tonnes), the U.S. (71K tonnes) and Austria (70K tonnes) followed a long way behind the leaders.

From 2007 to 2018, the most notable rate of growth in terms of exports, amongst the main exporting countries, was attained by Mexico, while exports for the other global leaders experienced more modest paces of growth.

Export Prices by Country

In 2018, the average toilet paper export price amounted to $1,735 per tonne, increasing by 5.9% against the previous year. Over the period under review, the toilet paper export price continues to indicate a relatively flat trend pattern. The pace of growth appeared the most rapid in 2008 when the average export price increased by 15% y-o-y. Over the period under review, the average export prices for toilet paper attained their maximum at $1,903 per tonne in 2011; however, from 2012 to 2018, export prices stood at a somewhat lower figure.

Prices varied noticeably by the country of origin; the country with the highest price was the U.S. ($2,648 per tonne), while Slovakia ($1,346 per tonne) was amongst the lowest.

From 2007 to 2018, the most notable rate of growth in terms of prices was attained by the U.S., while the other global leaders experienced more modest paces of growth.

Imports 2007-2018

In 2018, the global toilet paper imports amounted to 2.1M tonnes, growing by 5.1% against the previous year. The total import volume increased at an average annual rate of +1.4% over the period from 2007 to 2018; the trend pattern remained relatively stable, with somewhat noticeable fluctuations being observed throughout the analyzed period. The most prominent rate of growth was recorded in 2010 when imports increased by 7.9% year-to-year. Over the period under review, global toilet paper imports attained their peak figure in 2018 and are likely to continue its growth in the immediate term.

In value terms, toilet paper imports amounted to $3.6B (IndexBox estimates) in 2018.

Imports by Country

The U.S. (208K tonnes) and Germany (199K tonnes) represented roughly 20% of total imports of toilet paper in 2018. It was followed by the Netherlands (100K tonnes), achieving a 4.9% share of total imports. The following importers – France (87K tonnes), China, Hong Kong SAR (83K tonnes), Denmark (72K tonnes), Saudi Arabia (66K tonnes), Canada (66K tonnes), Belgium (64K tonnes), the Czech Republic (60K tonnes), Norway (52K tonnes) and Austria (48K tonnes) – together made up 29% of total imports.

From 2007 to 2018, the most notable rate of growth in terms of imports, amongst the main importing countries, was attained by Saudi Arabia, while imports for the other global leaders experienced more modest paces of growth.

In value terms, the U.S. ($375M), Germany ($320M) and the Netherlands ($164M) were the countries with the highest levels of imports in 2018, with a combined 24% share of global imports.

Import Prices by Country

In 2018, the average toilet paper import price amounted to $1,747 per tonne, jumping by 3.1% against the previous year. Overall, the toilet paper import price continues to indicate a relatively flat trend pattern. The pace of growth appeared the most rapid in 2008 when the average import price increased by 9.5% against the previous year. Over the period under review, the average import prices for toilet paper attained their maximum at $1,937 per tonne in 2011; however, from 2012 to 2018, import prices remained at a lower figure.

Prices varied noticeably by the country of destination; the country with the highest price was Norway ($2,473 per tonne), while Saudi Arabia ($1,460 per tonne) was amongst the lowest.

From 2007 to 2018, the most notable rate of growth in terms of prices was attained by China, Hong Kong SAR, while the other global leaders experienced more modest paces of growth.

Source: IndexBox AI Platform