KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 11 (Bernama) -- Minister of Plantation Industries and Commodities, YB Datuk Seri Mah Siew Keong convened a special roundtable meeting with leaders from rubber industry to seek their combined opinions on measures to further boost rubber glove industry’s contribution to Malaysian economy.
 
During the meeting, YB Datuk Seri Mah Siew Keong revealed that Malaysia’s exports of rubber gloves in the first six months of 2017 (January – June) reported an impressive 25% increase to reach RM7.95 billion compared to RM5.28 billion from the same period in 2016. 

The high export growth in the first six months of 2017 signalled that the rubber glove sector is on track to record an outstanding new high in export sales of RM16 billion in the full year of 2017, an increase of 20% compared to RM13.28 billion recorded for the whole year 2016.

Rubber gloves has been the largest contributor to the Malaysian rubber products industry. The export sales of rubber gloves accounted over 70% of the total exports of rubber products which amounted to RM11.4 billion for the first six months of 2017.

Malaysia is currently the world’s largest supplier of rubber gloves fulfilling 60% of the total global supply in volume terms, supplying approximately 126 billion pieces of rubber gloves as of 2016.

Rubber gloves from Malaysia are exported to more than 190 countries worldwide. Malaysia’s number one position in global market for rubber gloves is currently at a strong position and is way ahead of its closest competitors, Thailand and China which ranked second and third largest exporting countries respectively. 

Given the expected strong export performance this year, YB Datuk Seri Mah Siew Keong is confident that Malaysia will continue to dominate the world market for rubber gloves especially for medical gloves usage in the healthcare sector. 

With increasing demand for higher quality medical gloves in major emerging markets coupled with industry moves to expand production capacity and to improve manufacturing processes, YB Datuk Seri Mah Siew Keong believes that this will help the industry to achieve the target of securing at least 65% share of global exports of rubber gloves by 2020.

In his closing remarks, YB Datuk Seri Mah Siew Keong concluded that based on the current trend of global import growth, Ministry of Plantation Industries and Commodities (MPIC) and Malaysian Rubber Export Promotion Council (MREPC) projected that world demand for rubber gloves will increase from 211 billion pieces in 2016 to reach 287 billion pieces by 2020. 

SOURCE : Ministry of Plantation Industries and Commodities

FOR MORE INFORMATION, PLEASE CONTACT: 
Name : Kartina Binti Hamzah
Tel: 03-88878236 
Fax: 03-8887 8205
Email: kartina@mpic.gov.my  

--BERNAMA