After the recovery in 2010 following the previous financial downturn, the indications are that paper and board production by CEPI member countries fell in 2011 by close to 2% as the momentum of the revival was affected by the economic slowdown, particularly in the second half of the year. With overall volumes continuing to remain some way below pre-crisis levels it is estimated that CEPI member countries produced around 95 milliontonnes of paper and board in 2011. Paper production had reached 103 million tonnes in 2007 and decreased by 13% between 2007 and 2009 before increasing by over 8% in 2010. European pulp & paper production level remains slightly below theaverage European manufacturing industry performance but still above other energyintensive sectors.
Based on estimates it would appear that the performance of the CEPI countries in total during 2011 is similar to that of most of the other major paper producing regions of the world with the exception of South Korea and China, which have performed better. It is estimated that world paper production has recorded a very limited growth in 2011, around 0.5%.
Average quarterly production level for 2011 was in the region of between 23.5 million and 24 million tonnes whereas in 2006 and 2007 the average quarterly production was over 25 million tonnes.
