Players meet at ChemOrbis Asia 8th Petrochemicals Conference

Plastics players from 21 different countries came together at ChemOrbis Asia 8th Petrochemicals Conference that was held on April 23, 2018 at the Sofitel Shanghai Hongqiao Hotel in Shanghai, China. The event featured presentations of key executives from leading global companies while also providing networking opportunities to the attendees during several coffee breaks, an open buffet lunch and a networking cocktail.

Following the keynote speeches by Wim Roels, CEO of Borouge, and Mr. Ajay Shah, Polymers President at Reliance, the first presentation of the conference came from Ms. Kelly Ciu, Senior Consultant at Wood Mackenzie. During her speech, Ms. Ciu examined the current status of global feedstocks markets in the perspective of China’s CTO/MTO industry.

Following the lunch break, Mr. Dmitry Shastin from SIBUR gave the next presentation entitled, “Producer’s Perspective: Growth Drivers at Polyolefins World Landscape”. Mr. Shastin focused on the global PP and PE markets by highlighting the key drivers of growth. “The global PE market is changing dramatically in response to the advancing industrialization of the emerging markets while PP continues to be very dynamic, led by strong demand growth in Asia,” he noted.

The next presentation came from Mr. Hossein Pirrasoolzadeh, Foreign Commercial Director at PGPICC, who focused on Iran’s petrochemical industry with a descriptive overview on the current situation. During his presentation, Mr. Pirrasoolzadeh shared updates on the ongoing and upcoming petrochemical projects in Iran as well as the recent developments regarding the sanctions.

Ms. Bongkotthip Srithavatchai from Nexant opened the last session of the conference with her presentation entitled, “Asia PVC Market Overview”. Ms. Srithavatchai predicted that global PVC market would grow at slower rates compared to historical figures as China’s demand growth decelerates year by year. According to her, China and India will remain the main drivers for PVC demand while the US is likely to remain major PVC exporter.

Mr. Vipin Kumar, head of Asia PET Business at Indorama, gave the next talk focusing on China’s PET market from a global perspective. During his speech, Mr. Kumar evaluated the possible impacts of China’s waste import ban as well as new anti-dumping duties on global trade flows.

The conference closed with a presentation from Mr. Dmitri Nadezhdin from LLC TH Plastic, who spoke about global PS markets while paying particular attention to Asia. Mr. Nadezhdin shared valuable data about the consumption of styrenics across the Asian markets as well as the growth prospects over the coming years.