At a press briefing held via Web conference today, the Society of the Plastics Industry, Inc. (SPI) presented the results for two of the society’s major reports: "Global Business Trends" and "Size and Impact of the Plastics Industry on the U.S. Economy." Despite overall downward trends in the manufacturing sector, SPI’s senior director of international trade, Neil Pratt, had a positive forecast for U.S. plastics. The study noted the creation of 339 new facilities since the previous year’s report and a $1.3-billion increase in capital expenses for that same period. Using a model based on the first eight months of 2007 (and tested against the accuracy of the previous years’ predictions), SPI projects total exports for 2007 to be over $48 billion, while imports hold at under $40 billion.
As in previous years, the major growth sector for U.S. plastics remains resins, $2 billion of which exported to China in 2006, the year covered by the study. Responding to questions from "webinar" attendees, SPI representatives asserted that these resin export numbers had not benefited from a declining dollar due to the Chinese yuan’s continued fixed value to the American currency. The presentation concluded noting that competition with China in the plastic products sector of the industry accounted for a "significant portion of the trade deficit in processed products."
Electronic copies of both reports are available as .pdf files at the above links.