The fiscal year in India ends on 31 March and not end of December as in most other countries, that is why annual official statistics have the years 2015-2016. While the export statistics for countries show figures on expected lines, the statistics for imports may give a dramatically different picture next year with the new more liberalised import policy for marble.
The export statistics for natural stone to USA during 2014 reveal a disturbing trend when analysed in some detail. During the 2014 the US economy had already more or less recovered from the severe financial crisis of 2008 and 2009 and, for many businessmen in the industry it was almost back to normal. Anecdotal evidence suggests most of the wholesalers were seeing growth in their business, on average, to the extent of 20%, though the figure quoted offhand obviously varied from person to person and company to company.
Exports
In the year 2014 the Brazilian exports of ornamental stone and cladding reached 1.276 billion US$, corresponding to physical volume of almost 2.5 million tons. Processed stone consisted of almost 80% of sales and more than half of the total physical volume exported. Rough stone, on its part, represented 20.69% of sales and 48.84% of total physical volume exported.
Source: IMIB - MarbleTrend Magazine
Natural Stone imports by countries (in thousand Euro)
The US Market for natural stone is the biggest source of demand for many stone processing factories all over the world, and the recent recovery of that market has proved to be a blessing for the companies that have good knowledge of the market. Stone imports in 2013 reached a figure of almost US$ 2.8 billion, according to the data provided by the US International Trade Commission.
Source: IMIB - Marble Trend Magazine (Turkey)
