S TAT I S T I C S
Ceramic tile imports 2018-2019 Peter Halliday presents the latest data on ceramic tile imports and how it is affected by changes in construction activity
T
he Australian building and construction industry has faced a number of challenges during the last year. Aside from the widely reported problems with combustible cladding and cracks appearing in several high-rise Sydney apartments, cracks have been appearing in the long running residential construction boom. Building approvals and dwelling commencements, especially multiunit dwellings, are both lower than one year ago. In July 2019, the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) reported residential building approvals had reached a six-year low, falling 25.6% in the 12 months to the end of June 2019. The largest fall in approvals was in multi-unit dwellings, a fall of 39.3%. Private single dwelling approvals fell by 14.8% in the same period. While lower building approvals point to a fall in future activity, building commencements are good indicators of recent and current requirements for ceramic tiles. Fig.1 illustrates the link between ceramic tile import figures and residential
building commencement numbers. The Housing Industry Association (HIA) expects dwelling unit commencements to drop to 170,000 in 2019, down from 221,877 built in the 2018. Forecasts suggest that 2019-20 will be the low point in dwelling construction with the mid 2020 forecast to see a gradual upturn through to 2022. There has been some positive news however with AMP Capital revising their forecast down from a 15% peak-to-trough fall to a 12% fall, while recent lending data showed an uplift in investor loans for the first time in almost one year. As tiles are required at the end of the construction cycle however, there is a timing delay in imports being affected. While the fall in building approvals has been occurring since 2017, the long run of almost record volumes of ceramic tile import levels has inevitably seen a downturn since late 2018. Imports of ceramic tiles in the 2018-2019 financial year (1 July 2018 to 30 June 2019) totalled 42,177,154 square metres with a total Australian
Customs value of A$455,488,586. This represents a decline of 4,056,741 square metres or -8.8% on the last financial year. The decline in Australian customs value was much lower, falling A$13,912,381 less or -3.0%. The rolling 12 month import quantity graph in Fig.2, illustrates the sharp downturn in ceramic tile imports since the September Quarter 2018. While the decline over the full financial year was -8.8%, the decline in the last three quarters compared with the same quarters in the previous year was greater at -10.5% in December Quarter 2018, -17.3% in March Quarter 2019 and -13.4% in the June Quarter 2019. The detailed breakdown of the import data by country of origin and destination state is shown in Fig.3. The average price per square metre of imported tiles increased to A$10.80, a reversal of recent declines in average value, due to the ongoing decline in Australia’s foreign exchange rate. Once again, over 91% of imports originate from just four nations. China still supplies the overwhelming 18
FIG.1 DWELLING COMMENCEMENTS AND TILE IMPORTS
Data source: ABS, HIA
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