India's carbon black demand to grow 4-5%: Sanjiv Goenka

Kolkata: India's domestic demand for carbon black is expected to grow at four to five per cent in the current fiscal, industrialist Sanjiv Goenka said today.

The sector also stands to gain from the recent re-imposition of anti-dumping duty on import of truck and bus radial tyres from China for a period of five years by the government.

"Domestic demand for carbon black will be 4-5 per cent in the current fiscal," Philips Carbon Black chairman Sanjiv Goenka said at the company's AGM here today.

Carbon black is used as a reinforcing filler in tyres and other rubber products.

The anti-dumping duty on Chinese imports will make them costlier thereby providing a level playing field for Indian truck and bus tyre manufacturers, rating agency ICRA said today in a statement.

The anti-dumping duty ranges between USD 245.35 and USD 452.33 per tonne, depending on the producer and exporter, it said.

Philips Carbon Black, the country's largest carbon black maker, reported a robust 15 per cent growth in volume and sales in 2016-17.

The company will be investing Rs 300 crore to ramp up capacity at its plants in Gujarat and is also evaluating a greenfield plant in south India.

"We have a capacity of 4.8 lakh tonne per annum of carbon black and now we will be investing Rs 300 crore in Palej and Mundra plants of Gujarat to add another 80,000 tonne capacity. The new capacity will be ready by FY2019," Goenka had said recently.

The company is planning to set up a greenfield plant with a a capacity of 1.2 lakh tonne in south India.

Disclaimer: This information has been collected through secondary research and IBEF is not responsible for any errors in the same.