As the economy downturn is getting worse, most of the petrochemical companies are not seeing the bottom-out yet; or signs of recovery for their petrochemical business, at least not from BASF. As BASF CEO CEO Jurgen Hambrecht, put it, BASF is not expecting a growth for 2009, worse still is expected to shrink.
To date, as much as 25% of BASF operating units worldwide have been shut down or idling due to uneconomical route of production especially in North America and Asia Pacific. Most of BASF's units are to make coatings, performance plastics, electronics and intermediates which are taking toll due to significant dropped in automatives and construction business.
BASF is expecting that more operating units will be closed and possible of job cuts; especially for units not serving the crops, hygienes and oil & gas industry. The plastic business seems to be taking the strongest hit so far.
No comments:
Post a Comment