Indian Rubber Industry Consumes 1 Million Tonnes

(Rubber Asia/India) The Indian rubber industry used up a total of over a million tonnes of various types of rubber during 2003/04, according to data compiled by the Automotive tyre Manufacturers Association (ATMA).

Of this, the tyre industry alone (including cycle tyres & tubes and camelback) consumed 478,734 tonnes of natural rubber — 66.5 per cent of all natural rubber (NR) consumed by the Indian industry as a whole. The tyre segment was also by far the largest consumer of synthetic rubber (140,960 tonnes out of a total of 210,190 tonnes) and reclaimed rubber (38,532 tonnes out of 70,460).

More importantly, the Indian auto tyre segment still has 73.34 per cent of its rubber consumption in the form of natural rubber with synthetic rubber (SR) accounting for 23.73 per cent and reclaimed rubber 2.93 per cent. This NR:SR ratio is almost the reverse of the pattern elsewhere in the tyre-making world.