Following Europe and the United States, and the BRIC countries, Brazil, India and China, Russia, Turkey and Japan are joining the ranks of the heavy weight agricultural machinery markets. This picture is taking shape at EIMA International, the great mechanization review taking the stage tomorrow at the Bologna Fiere and authoritative observatory for gauging the dynamics on the primary sector and technologies for agriculture. India and China were confirmed in 2011 as the countries with the greatest take-up of tractors with sales of 430,000 and 400,000 units in the power categories over 30 hp and not counting the vast numbers of self-propelled machinery. Europe was shifted to become the second world market at 136,000 tractors ahead of the United States at 84,000 units with the arrival of new and important majors on the scene. Take up in Turkey exceeded 55,000 tractors to signal an enormous gain of 67% over the previous year, the surge in Russia came to 70% with 35,000 units moved and sales climbed in Japan in the wake of the great natural catastrophy and nuclear power disaster which struck the country.
Investments in agriculture led to sales of more than 17,000 tractors, a figure taken to 45,300 units if lower powered units were included, marking a 5% increase over the already positive trend of the previous year. Data on 2012 are confirming these trends. Estimates of growth come to around 10% for China (in August), show a sharp gain for Japan of 13% over the first nine months of the year, and point to sound increases for Russia, up 17% in the first half.
FederUnacoma President Massimo Goldoni, the head of the manufacturers federation, told a press conference in Bologna this morning, “The countries reporting the best markets trends for agricultural machinery are those showing the most positive economic trends and are thus given possibilities for installing specific support policies for agriculture and mechanization.” Also the figures for Europe confirm the close relationship between general economic conditions and the mechanization market with growth in sales in the more economically solid countries and great declines in the weaker countries.
Over the first nine months of the year tractor sales rose 5% in Germany and 14% in France but fell 8.6% in Spain, tumbled 19.5% in Portugal (in the first 6 months of the year) and plunged by 64% in Greece in the first half of the year. Also Italy is ranked among the countries in recession and is coping with steep drops in registrations. By October, tractor sales were down 16.6% with 17,130 units sold and the outlook for the full year is for sales below 20,000 units. Also down were combines, 5.3% off at 375 units sold, transporters with loading beds, 24.4% in the negative at 1,011 units, and trailers, falling 9.8% at 9,144 units. The Italian industry is thus penalized by the domestic market trend but can count on a substantial increase in exports. After closing 2011 with growth in value pegged at more than 14%, the Italian industry went on to run up further gains in the first seven months of this year (January-July) over the same period in 2011 which came to 11.9% for tractors and 8.5% for other types of machinery, according to foreign trade data made public by the National Statistics Institute, ISTAT. Overall, the volume of business reported for the first seven months came to € 2.734 billion for an increase of 9.7%.
Foreign markets, development policies and lining up supply and demand of technologies on a world scale are shaping up as the hottest issues for EIMA International now celebrating its record-breaking 2012 edition on an area of 140,000 m² with 1,750 manufacturing industries from fifty countries exhibiting in more than 1,000 merchandise classifications, an exhibition rounded out by four specialized salons focusing on components, in EIMA Components, bio-energy in EIMA Energy, multifunctional agriculture, in EIMA M.i.A., and gardening and groundskeeping in EIMA Green, a sector returning to EIMA again beginning with this edition.
Press Office FederUnacoma/Eima
