German waste paper exports reach record low in 2019

|
|

Excess supply ups pressure on waste paper recyclers, sending German recovered paper prices further down, EUWID market intelligence revealed.

More and more paper for recycling is piling up in Germany. This resulted in a significant drop in recovered paper prices (RCP) in recent months, EUWID reported in the latest market and price report for Germany.  

A closer view of Germany's trade balance in waste paper reveals one reason for the current oversupply situation. In addition to slower demand from recycled paper manufacturers, Germany's exports have fallen to a new low in 2019. At the same time, imports of recovered paper continued to reach record levels.

According to preliminary figures published by the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis), Germany exported a total of 2.36 million t of recovered paper in 2019. This was a 14 per cent reduction against the previous year. The main reason for the decline in 2019 was the significant drop in exports to China, which drastically reduced the imports of paper for recycling over the last two years.  

In 2019, German imports of recovered paper totaled 4.60 million t and almost reached the historic high reported for 2018, when German paper mills and RCP traders purchased 4.62 million t of recovered paper from abroad.

This article is part of our coverage on recovered paper markets in Germany.

In order to gain full access to EUWID Pulp and Paper news content, and market and price reports on major pulp, paper and board markets in Europe consider subscribing to EUWID Pulp and Paper .

- Ad -
- Ad -