Russia returns to form

With a growth in tile consumption of around 10.6% in 2010, Russia appears to have put the worst of the international crisis behind it. The outlook for 2011 is positive for the domestic market, which is expected to continue the strong performance reported in the second half of 2010. According to estimates, national output will experience further growth of close to 10% by the end of the year, bringing production to around 138-139 million sq.m as a result of greater use of installed capacity.

The 2010 recovery is reflected by imports (a third of which originated from Belarus), up from 30 million sq.m in 2009 to more than 36 million sq.m last year, an increase of 21% (although volumes still fall far short of the peaks of 2008 when imports reached 54 million sq.m). Exports also performed well in 2010 with an increase of a million euro to reach 9 million sq.m, as did local production which rose by 7.7% over 2009 putting an end to the negative trend.