Russian Petchem Giant SIBUR To Boost Investments To Meet Greater Turkish Demand

Russia's largest petrochemical plant SIBUR plans to expand investments in facilities in Russia to meet Turkey's growing domestic demand, the executive director for Marketing and Sales, Procurement, Innovation and Business Development told Anadolu Agency in a recent interview.

Sergey Komyshan said the company plans to further increase the supply of linear polyethylene consumption in Turkey, which showed growth last year.

He said the company views the Turkish market as lucrative with "extremely high potential especially in certain sectors of the economy."

One of the sectors the company will focus on is the supply to Turkey of polypropylene copolymers used in household appliances and car parts.

He sees a recovery in demand from the COVID-19 pandemic in supplies to carpet yarn manufacturers, which, he said "have rapidly adjusted to their new working and living circumstances and are optimistic about the future."

'Turkey will become a key destination for SIBUR's products'

"Turkey will undoubtedly continue to be one of the main supply regions of SIBUR as well as a sale and delivery hub for products to be delivered to various regions such as Israel and North Africa," he said.

SIBUR will broaden investments with a view to producing 45,000 tons per year of maleic anhydride, some of which will be supplied to Turkey next year. "Discussions with the main buyers have already been completed and first deliveries will be sent next year."

Revealing plans for the completion in 2024 of one of the largest facilities in Russia, a natural gas facility in the Amur oblast in the country's far east, Komyshan said its completion would enable the company to increase polypropylene and polyethylene export volumes.

The production volume of the new plant will be more than 2.7 million tons of polymer, he said.

Turkish-Russian cooperation in Russia

Komyshan said he wants to build on the cooperation that the company has established with Turkish companies, like Ronesans, in the construction of facilities in Russia. He cited the country's largest petrochemical plant ZapSibNeftekhim (ZapSib) in the Siberia region, a Turkish-Russian partnership, which he said has completely changed SIBUR's position in the Turkish market.

"The increase in polypropylene production has made SIBUR one of the three largest polypropylene importers in Turkey in 2020. We started the first polyethylene deliveries last year, and by 2021 we plan to be one of the three companies that imports the most high-density polyethylene and linear low-density polyethylene," Komyshan said, underlining that their main achievement was not volume growth.

"ZapSib has enabled us to offer polymers for a variety of applications, allowing us to increase our customer base several-fold. We plan to expand our polymer range at ZapSib and supply it to our Turkish customers on a regular basis."

*Writing By Sibel Morrow in Ankara -