The Gulf Organization for Industrial Consulting (GOIC) stresses the importance of expanding the paper industry and overcoming the challenges it faces in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries in light of the high demand for these products due to increased health awareness. 
The report of GOIC's Gulf Industrial Knowledge Centre (GIKC) said that the cumulative investments in the paper products manufacture reached approximately 3.9 billion USD in 2015, compared to about 2.6 billion USD in 2010, an increase of approximately 49% and a CAGR of 8.3% during this period. 
According to the report, Saudi Arabia was ranked first, with cumulative investments reaching more than 3 billion USD or 77.5% of the total investments in the GCC paper products industry in 2015. The UAE was ranked second with a share of 14.2%, followed by Kuwait (4.6%), Oman (2%) and then Qatar and Bahrain with smaller percentages. 
The report revealed that there has been an increase in the number of factories operating in the area of paper industries in the GCC. In fact, there was 459 factories in 2015 compared to 346 in 2010, an increase of approximately 32.7% reflecting the surging demand for these products. 
According to the report, investments in pulp and paperboard doubled between 2010 and 2015, and the manufacture of corrugated paper, containers made of paper or paperboard increased by about 58% during the same period of time, with the construction of new factories with high design capacities to respond to the growing local demand for these products. 
Moreover, GCC exports in 2015 reached approximately 939000 tonnes valued at more than 1.3 billion USD. Hence, the net imports amounted to approximately 2.7 million tonnes with a value of about 2.6 billion USD. Saudi Arabia's share of the total net imports was 43.4%, followed by the UAE (32.6%), Kuwait (12.8%), Qatar (6.8%), Oman (2.7%) and Bahrain (1.7%). 
According to the report, the recycling industry is very important in the GCC region and there is big room for the expansion of this industry that is capable of providing promising investment opportunities. Indeed, the recycling consumption markets are big and so are its economic benefits such as limiting the need for raw materials imports, providing more job opportunities, and guaranteeing good return for the entrepreneurs. In addition to that, recycling is inexpensive, energy efficient and recycling of waste paper in particular increases the proceeds from pulp compared to other raw materials. Investments can also be made in projects to collect, sort and press paper waste and sell it to factories. 
The report reveled that there are several recycling industries in different GCC countries, but this industry faces a number of obstacles hindering its expansion throughout the GCC such as: the absence of large areas necessary to store and collect paper waste and others, the need for skilled workers and the lack of necessary quantities of paper waste for factories to become operational. In fact, despite the large quantities of paper waste that can be beneficial for the recycling industry, only a small share is available.

Source: QNA