Italy’s appetite for US wet blue continues
20/11/2017
Shipments of wet-salted hides in the first nine months of this year have increased by 17% of volume and by 11% in value compared to the same months in 2016. Between January and September 2017, packers and traders exported almost 18.3 million wet-salted hides. These hides brought in export revenues of more than $1.1 billion.
Over the same period, however, exports of wet blue hides fell by 5% in volume, to 4.6 million hides, and by 3% in value, reaching $436.6 million.
As has been the case throughout 2017, Italy, the most prestigious tanning market in the world, represents the most striking exception when it comes to US wet blue. While their competitors in markets such as China, Vietnam, Thailand and the Dominican Republic have reduced the volume of wet blue hides that they have bought this year, Italian tanners have increased their use of this type of raw material by 40% in volume and by 37% in value.
Tanners in Italy imported almost 1.8 million US wet blue hides in the first three quarters of this year, paying $168.6 million for them. During the same period in 2016, Italy’s tanners swallowed up a 25.7% share of US wet blue resources; their share now is 38% of the total.
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