European wood flooring production stabilises
Production of engineered and solid wood flooring stabilised in Continental Europe last year.
Figures from the Euopean Federation of the Parquet Industry (FEP) show that production increased by 1.65% to 70.71million sqm. Poland maintained its position as the leading producer with 17.61%, followed by Germany (14.63%) and Sweden (13.26%).
FEP says the picture would have been more encouraging if some production had not been switched to Eastern Europe outwith the FEP area of Austria, Belgium, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, The Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and Turkey.
FEP says this would have increased production by another 2%-3%. Production peaked at 100.3million sqm in 2007.
Despite the condition of various economies, overall consumption only fell by 1.65% to 91.47million sqm, helped by rises of 15.5% in Sweden, 14.2% in Austria and 6.68% in Germany respectively.
As expected Germany remains the largest market, accounting for 22.59% of sales, followed by France, Italy and Spain.