Blog - Pulp, Paper and Paperboard

Digitalization has put pressure on the world’s trade of printing and writing paper. Over the past decade, global imports of printing and writing paper dropped from 47M tonnes in 2010 to 31M tonnes in 2020. In value terms, imports declined to $27.6B. The U.S., Germany and France remain the largest importers of printing and writing paper worldwide. China features as the only county that boosted its paper imports last year. In 2020, the average printing and writing paper import price fell by -3.2% y-o-y to $899 per tonne 2020. Germany, Indonesia, Finland and Sweden constitute the largest exporters of printing and writing paper.  

China’s imports of wrapping paper, packaging paper and paperboard reached the highest level ever, picking up by +54% to 892K tonnes in 2020. Russia, India and Viet Nam constitute the largest suppliers to China. Last year, Russia and India boosted their exports to China threefold, while Viet Nam saw a 58%-spike in terms of volume of exported products to China. In 2020, the average wrapping paper import price dropped by -24.1% y-o-y. 

In 2020, China increased its chemical wood pulp imports by +10% y-o-y to 24M tonnes. It was driven by rising demand for paper packaging and tableware amid the pandemic and further stimulated by a sharp fall in import prices last year. Brazil, Indonesia and Canada are the major suppliers, providing 57% of the total import volume. Bleached sulphate pulp accounted for 95% of total wood pulp imports into China. 

Paper waste exporters worldwide now have to shift their supply chains: China, a global key processor of imported waste, banned solid waste imports in 2021. Countries with insufficient domestic paper processing capacity will now be forced to develop these facilities, against the current global trend towards the circular economy. 

Because of the pandemic-related shifts in downstream industries, pulp manufacturers are forced to correct their market strategies towards the rapid increase of the use of packaging paper. In the medium term, value chain sustainability emerges as the most important factor due to the tightening of environmental regulation.

In 2019, the global paperboard case material market decreased by -8.4% to $116.1B for the first time since 2016, thus...

The revenue of the dissolving grade wood pulp market in the European Union amounted to $1.6B in 2018, waning by -5.6% against the previous year.

The revenue of the tissue paper market in Spain amounted to $228M in 2018, surging by 2.6% against the previous year....

The revenue of the folding boxboard market in the European Union amounted to $9.6B in 2018. Germany, Poland and France constitute the largest markets for folding boxboard.