India emerges as a growing mkt for Bangladesh WPP bags
Dated- 22 May , 2012 - India
India has emerged as a growing market for local woven polypropylene (WPP) bags, which industry owners attributed to huge demand of the world class packaging materials in the neighbouring country's cement sector.
They said India has a large cement market which is expanding day by day, but it has no adequate packaging material factories to meet up their growing demand.
So they are gradually depending on Bangladeshi WPP cement bags (adstar bags), said Bangladesh Plastic Goods Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BPGMEA) WPP standing committee chairman Kazi Anwarul Haque.
"We have already started shipment of the products to the neighbouring country from last November," he said adding around 450 tonnes of pp woven bags worth $ 0.9 million are being exported from the country each month.
He also said the export volume of the plastic products will stand at 900 tonnes from next year and the increasing trend will be continuing in coming days.
Nearly 5,000 tonnes of WPP cement bags are being used in the fast growing developing country monthly.
India is the second largest producer of quality cement in the world. The industry is growing at the rate of 8.0 per cent per annum owing to numerous plants of cement spread across the country from North to South and East to West. There are 120 large and 300 mini cement plants in the country.
Local Bengal Plastic Industries Ltd, Madina Polymer Industries Limited, and Akij Group export plastic WPP bags in the South Asian country.
Presently the Bangladeshi cement bags are going to West Bengal, said Mr Haque also the vice president of BPGMEA adding we will start selling the products in Tripura region very soon.
The export prospect of the product in the European Union and USA has also become bright following the anti -dumping duty and wage hike of workers in China, Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand.
Now EU and USA are importing nearly 75 per cent of the local WPP bags.
Once China, Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand would meet up the Eurozone demand but now they are reducing production following the wage hike, said industry people.
They said, Canada and Australia can also be prospective markets for our plastic bags but the government has to come forward to explore the potentiality.
According to the association, presently local manufacturers export nearly 9,000 tonnes of WPP bags worth around $ 100 million.
Nearly 300 trillion WPP bags are being used in the globe for packaging of food grains and other products per year.
The export earning from this sector can be increased to $ 300 million in a short time if the government gives cash incentive to the sector, the industry leaders opined.
WPP bags are widely used for bagging of fertilizer, cement, building materials, salt, food grains, onion, potato, rice , wheat, flour, pulse, dates, maize, powdered milk, fruits, chemicals, sugar, poultry and fish feeds etc.
Presently the total investment of the country's WPP sector has exceeded Tk 25.0 billion. Annual turnover is more than Tk 25.5 billion with 20 per cent growth.
The sector has 60 factories with direct and indirect employments of more than 100,000 people, most of the whom are females.
