Bleakest situation in the auto, home appliances and construction materials fields: 5.5bn euros vanish in one year
The automotive industry, electronics and home appliances retail
and the construction materials market, fields that last year
totalled 13bn euros, that is over 10% in GDP, have been among the
hardest hit by the financial crisis this year. On the three
markets, sales dropped by margins ranging between 30% and 55%, a
decline that wiped out around 5.5bn euros from consumer
spending.
The Romanian electronics and electrical home appliances market this
year contracted by almost half a billion euros, falling from
1.2-1.3bn euros in late 2008 to around 800m euros in 2009. The
largest part of the 500m-euro loss of the market was located at the
level of specialised retailers, whose sales are set to go down by
300m euros by yearend, according to announced business plans.
The auto market in 2009 suffered the steepest decline of the past
20 years. After ten years of consecutive two-digit increases, car
sales this year posted drops of as much as 60%, to a volume of
130,000 units, similar to the level of 2003 market. Sales of cars
and commercial vehicles are put at 2bn euros this year, down 3.5bn
euros from last year, according to ZF estimates. The overall car
market shrank by 55%, to 147,000 units this year.
The construction materials market dropped by 27.2% in the first 11
months of the year from the similar period of 2008, with sales of
thermo-insulating carpentry, cement and masonry materials as the
hardest hit. In this context, the Association of Romania's
Construction Materials Producers (APMCR) expects the market to
reach 5-5.2bn euros this year, down 23% from 2008.
"For 2009, we project a value of 3.8-3.9bn euros of turnover on the
construction materials market, without taking into account imports.
These are put at 1.2-1.3bn euros, resulting in a market of
5.0-5.2bn euros. Compared with the market of 2008, which we put at
6.5bn euros, we're witnessing a decline," stated Claudiu Georgescu,
APMCR chairman.