As we all know, to judge the market size of a certain product in a certain country, we should know the production volume, imports and exports of this product in that country. The difficulty of assessing the size of the Russian nonwovens market is that the production volume of nonwovens is in square meters in Russia's official statistics, while the import and export volumes are in kilotons. According to the report of the Russian State Statistics Office, in 2021, Russia's nonwovens (except felt) production volume already reached 6.027 billion square meters, 10.5% more than 5.453 billion square meters in 2020. If you refer to other statistical data, the production volune of Russian nonwovens and finished products (except clothing) in 2021 is 7.440 billion square meters. Among them, 82% of non-woven fabrics are produced in the Central District (central district centered on Moscow), 14% are produced in the Volga District, and the Northwest and Ural regions account for 1.9% and 1.1% respectively. Other regions do not account more than 1%.
Figure 1:2010-2021 Production of nonwovens (excluding felt) in Russia
According to the report of the Russian Federal Customs Administration, in 2021 the imports of nonwovens in Russia is 105,100 tons, a year-on-year increase of 6.1%. The largest sources of Russian nonwovens imports are China and Belarus, accounting for 38.1% and 22.5% respectively.
Figure 2: 2017-2021 Russian nonwovens imports and exports
Table 1: Import volume of nonwovens in Russia in 2021
In 2021, Russia's nonwovens exports is 32,800 tons, a year-on-year decrease of 16.0%. Kazakhstan, Belarus and Ukraine are the main export destinations, and these three countries accounted for 25.1%, 18.3% and 13.1% in Russia's total nonwovens exports.
Table 2: Russian nonwovens export volume in 2021
To understand the situation of the Russian nonwovens market, you need to pay attention to the following indicators: the production volume, imports and exports of synthetic staple fibers and staple fibers which are used to produce nonwovens. In 2021, the production volume of all types of synthetic fibers in Russia is 202,000 tons, of which the production volume data of short fibers has not yet been released. Based on the data of previous years, it is estimated that short fibers will account for about 60%.
Figure 3: Russian synthetic staple fiber production, imports and exports from 2017 to 2021 (Note: Production data includes tow, import and export data do not include tow.)
In 2021, Russia's imports of synthetic staple fibers reached 177,700 tons, a year-on-year increase of 27.8%. The largest sources of imports are Belarus, China, South Korea and Uzbekistan.
Table 3: Russian synthetic staple fiber imports in 2021
In 2021, Russia's imports of synthetic staple fibers reached 177,700 tons, a year-on-year increase of 27.8%. The largest sources of imports are Belarus, China, South Korea and Uzbekistan.
Table 4: Russian synthetic staple fiber exports in 2021
In 2021, Russia's imports of staple fibers is 22,200 tons, a year-on-year decrease of 6.1%. Staple fibers are mainly imported from China, Indonesia, India and Austria. The exports of Russian staple fiber is extremely low, the data in 2021 is 0.10 million tons. Russian man-made fiber production volume in 2021 is the same to 2020.
Table 5: Russian staple fiber imports in 2021
Figure 4: 2017-2021 Russian man-made fiber imports and production (Note: Production data includes all types of man-made fibers, and import data only includes short fibers.)