UK, Spain and Greece Remain the Major Slate Producers On the European Slate Market

IndexBox has just published a new report "EU: Slate - Market Report. Analysis And Forecast To 2025". Here is a summary of the report’s key findings.

The Three-year Upward Trend of Slate Consumption Was Replaced by a Slight Contraction

In wholesale prices, European slate market amounted to €255M in 2016, reducing noticeably over the last nine years. This figure reflects total revenue of producers and importers (excluding logistics costs, retail marketing costs, and retailers’ margins, which will be included in the final consumer price). In physical terms, the market stood at 2.6M tonnes, which reduced by 3% after a period of robust growth over 2013-2015 (IndexBox estimates).

The UK, Spain and Greece Constituted Major Slate Consumers

Amongst the EU members, the UK (34%), Spain (28%) and Greece (23%) were the countries with the largest volumes of slate consumption. Moreover, the highest levels of per capita slate consumption was observed in Greece (55.3 kg per year). In Spain (16.0 kg per year) and the UK (14 kg per year) per capita was at lower level, but still higher than the EU average (5.3 kg per year). These major consumers was followed by Poland (4%), Germany (3%) and Italy (2%). Poland significantly increased its consumption, while the other consumers had negative dynamics of slate consumption.

Production Reduced to Its Lowest Level in Value Terms

Production of slate displayed negative trend pattern over the last few years, finally amounting to €244M, which was the lowest level over the last nine years. In phisical terms production totalled 2.6M tonnes in 2016. It illustrated moderate recovery from 2012, with a slight 3% reduction over the last year.

UK, Spain and Greece Remained the Major Slate Producers

The countries with the highest levels of production in 2016 were the UK (32%), Spain (30%) and Greece (23%). With the following Poland (5%), France (3%) and Sweden (2%), they comprised 96% of total slate production. The major three global producers reduced its production, while France (+29.5%), Poland (+19.1%) and Sweden (+7.8%) experienced a notable growth in production levels from 2007 to 2016.

Overseas Shipments Do not Affect the Slate Market in the EU

The share of extra imports in total consumption was only 2% in physical terms and 7% in value terms, which indicates the independence of the EU slate market from foreign suppliers.

Exports of Slate in the EU Decreased Slightly

Total exports of slate in the EU amounted to 222K tonnes in 2016; after a sharp fall over 2008-2009, which was due to a slump in contruction industry during the global financial crisis, it bounced back and then leveled off through to 2016, with somewhat wild fluctuations in certain years.

France (117K tonnes), Spain (29K tonnes), Poland (23K tonnes), Portugal (14K tonnes) and Greece (12K tonnes) were the main suppliers of slate, comprising 88% of total exports in 2016. France and Greece were the fastest growing exportes: from 2007 to 2016, average annual growth rates of exports from these countries were +14.7% and +9.6%, respectively. By contrast, exports from the Czech Republic decreased at an average annual rate of -21.0% over the same period. Consequently, France (+34 percentage points) and Poland (+10 percentage points) significantly strengthened their positions in terms of the European slate exports. Meanwhile, the share of the Czech Republic illustrated negative dynamics, from 32% in 2007 to 3% in 2016.

Italy and the Czech Republic Emerged as the Fastest Growing Importer of Slate

In 2016, the UK (58K tonnes), France (48K tonnes), Italy (43K tonnes), Germany (41K tonnes), Czech Republic (28K tonnes), Belgium (17K tonnes) and Spain (14K tonnes) constituted the main destinations of slate imports. 

From 2007 to 2016, Italy and the Czech Republic indicated the highest growth rates in terms of the EU imports, with a CAGR of +15.1% and +20.9%, respectively. They was followed by the UK (+2.6%) and Germany (+3.9%). Imports to France and Belgium remained practically unchanged from the outset levels, while imports to Spain shrank substantially, decreasing by -8.4% per year over the last nine years.

Therefore, the shares of Italy (+11 percentage points), the Czech Republic (+8 percentage points), the UK (+5 percentage points) and Germany (+5 percentage points) significantly in terms of the EU imports increased, while the share of Spain waned from 11% in 2007 to 5% in 2016. The shares of the other countries remained relatively stable throughout the analyzed period.  

Do you want to know more about the European slate market? Get the latest trends and insight from our report. It includes a wide range of statistics on

• slate market share
• slate prices
• slate industry
• slate sales
• slate import
• slate export
• slate market forecast
• slate price forecast

Source: EU: Slate - Market Report. Analysis And Forecast To 2025