At the end of October 2011, the 21st “Plast Eurasia” (www.plasteurasia.com) plastic industry fair, held in Istanbul / Turkey, came to an end. Although by the time this article went to press, organiser Tüyap (Istanbul / Turkey; www.tuyap.com.tr) had not yet released the official visitor tally, exhibitor numbers were up 30% year-on-year at 1,020 firms from 44 different countries. Ahead of the event, Tüyap had said it expects visitor numbers to exceed 35,000.

The significant rise illustrates just how important Turkey has become in the plastics world, not least because of its strategic location between east and west. Aside from halls displaying plastics machinery and tools, the fair saw a large presence of raw material providers and companies offering intermediate products. The huge number of traders and distributors with stalls at the show illustrated well the strong focus on developing new markets in western and central Europe.

Ahead of the fair, Tüyap said it expects Turkey’s plastics industry to reach a production level of 7m t in 2011, with export volumes reaching USD 10 bn. Although annual growth has slowed to about 13% – in late 2010, Turkish plastics industry associations Pagev (Istanbul; www.pagev.org.tr) and Pagder (Istanbul; www.pagder.org) still had pegged it at 15% (see Plasteurope.com of 10.11.2010) – that is still a comfortable two-digit growth rate at times of economic volatility throughout the euro region. According to Pagev data, Turkey’s plastics sector exports to more than 200 countries worldwide.