“Glass pole to appear before court”, ran the headline in the German weekly, “Die Zeit”, in October 1962, before continuing with the question, “an inadmissible aid or natural progress?” What was under discussion were the first glass fibre poles used for pole vaulting, which catapulted athletes to previously undreamed of heights and which were to replace bamboo and metal across-the-board over the next few years. The new poles initially prompted heated discussions and calls for a ban, since large numbers of sportsmen and women, as well as coaches and officials, felt that they invalidated all the heights and records achieved with the standard type of poles. But there was no way of halting progress. The highest jump ever made with a bamboo pole was 4.77 m in 1942. The American athlete, Donald Bragg, jumped 4.70 m using the alternative aluminium pole at the Rome Olympic Games in 1960. Then, at the following Olympic Games in Tokyo in 1964, Fred Hansen (USA) exceeded the magical 5 m limit by a convincing 10 cm using a plastic pole – a height his fellow countryman Brian Steruber had set in 1963, similarly with a glass fibre pole.

It would have been impossible to imagine this year´s Olympic Games in Athens without plastics materials. “Material” is the key word here, since virtually all the different sporting disciplines benefit from polymeric materials to achieve higher speeds, greater heights and longer distances while, at the same time, ensuring a higher level of comfort, enjoyment and, not least, safety – without, of course, forgetting the possibilities that plastics have to offer in the leisure sector.

It is thus not surprising that German industry association Verband Kunststofferzeugende Industrie (VKE, D-60329 Frankfurt; www.vke.de) – soon to be renamed PlasticsEurope Deutschland – chose this particular field as a means of cultivating its image, providing sponsorship for the “Team Kunststoff” (Plastics Team) with 38 sportsmen and women in Athens. With its special show “Plastics in Sport and Leisure” at “K 2004”, the VKE will, additionally, be highlighting everything that polymeric materials can achieve in this sector, under the logo “Plastics – First Choice for Winners”.

The association estimates that only around 4% of all the plastics produced in Germany, which amounted to 16.8m t in 2003, go into the sports and leisure sector. These plastics, however, have the third-highest image value in Germany, ranking just marginally behind the plastics used for medical technology and automotive engineering. Some 85% of those who took part in the VKE´s current image survey specified that plastics were “indispensable” in this field, and only 15% regarded the material as “dangerous” for sports, games and leisure (for the construction industry applications for example, 35% of those questioned had misgivings).

Another factor that makes plastics so attractive in sport and leisure is the immense added value that this field has to offer, says VKE managing director, Kurt Stepping.

Each year, approximately USD 17bn worth of sports shoes are sold worldwide. The 15 biggest brand companies account for over 90% of these sales, with just three of them sharing 60% of the sales: Nike accounts for 34%, Reebok for 16% and adidas for 10%. A further 24% of the world market goes to another eight companies, including New Balance (8%) and Puma (5%).

The company which claims to be the world´s biggest producer of plastic semi-finished products in this field is framas Kunststofftechnik GmbH (D-66953 Pirmasens; www.framas.de). With more than 2,700 employees, the company produced some 9.5m pairs of outsoles, 3.5m pairs of socklinings, 120m pairs of toe and heel caps and 35m pairs of other shoe accessories in 2003, generating sales of around EUR 100m. Over the past few years, the company has set up two production facilities in China, and one each in Vietnam, Korea and Indonesia, including its own toolmaking departments. Its customers include the major sports shoe manufacturers, such as adidas, Puma, Nike and Reebok.

In the same way as nearly all framas products are made abroad, the shoe manufacturers have also moved their production to low-wage countries or outsourced it to companies in these countries. adidas, for example, has shoes produced in 18 factories overseas. The biggest of these are in the Chinese province of Guangdong. The factories owned by Yue Yuen Industrial Holding Ltd (www.yueyuen.com), part of Taiwan´s Pou Chen Group (www.pouchen.com.tw), produced more than 21m pairs of shoes for adidas in 2002. Some 30,000 people work for adidas here, along with 40,000 for Nike and a further 30,000 for other brands such as Lotto and Asics. Yue Yuen counts as the biggest producer of brand shoes worldwide, with an estimated market share of 17%. The company recorded sales of USD 2.5 bn in 2003, and an operating profit of USD 308m.

The working conditions and wages for shoes produced in these mainly Asian countries are frequently viewed critically. A study by the Christliche Initiative Romero (CIR, D-48143 Münster; www.ci-romero.de) shows that, of the retail price that a customer pays in a German shop (and the figures will scarcely differ in other European countries) some 83% on average remains in Germany, with 33% going to the brand company and 50% to the retail trade (value added tax included). The brand company invests an average of 11% of the shop price in research and a further 8.5% in advertising. Transport and taxes amount to another 5%. Finally, the cost of manufacture in the country of origin accounts for 12%. This, in turn, takes in 8% material costs and 2% production costs. CIR says that only 0.4% of the retail price for sports shoes is spent on wages in the countries of manufacture.