U.S. Recovered Fiber Exports Dipped 4%

SEATTLE (Scrap Monster): According to federal trade statistics published last week, the U.S. fiber exports recorded 4% decline during the first half of the current year. The exports totaled 9.68 million short tons in Jan-June ’19, which is down by nearly 4% when compared with the year before. The U.S. fiber exports had totaled 10.1 million short tons during the initial six-month period in 2018.

The largest importer of recovered fiber from the U.S. was China. However, the Chinese imports of recovered fiber fell sharply by almost 25% over the previous year. OCC accounted for over 71% of the total shipments. The other countries that reported reduced intake of recovered paper from the U.S. were India and Mexico. On the other hand, the import volumes by Canada, Indonesia, South Korea, Thailand, Taiwan and Vietnam increased significantly in H1 2019 than in the period from January to June in 2018.

The top buyer of recovered fiber from the U.S. was China, whose intake totaled 3.17 million short tons. In second place was India with 1.76 million short tons, followed by Mexico with 852,000 short tons. The other key importers along with their import volumes in thousand short tons are as follows: Indonesia (680), South Korea (565), Vietnam (539), Canada (530), Taiwan (462) and Thailand (319). The above countries together accounted for nearly 92% of the total U.S. recovered fiber exports.