ASEAN base metal demand to soar 65%: Researcher

ASEAN base metal demand to soar 65%: Researcher

SYDNEY (Reuter): ASEAN base metal demand is forecast to soar
65 percent over the next ten years, according to minerals
research house AME Mineral Economics.

"By then the total import requirement will be 4.05 million
tons, a much needed boost to a jaundiced industry," AME director
Peter Blackman told an ASEAN (Association of South East Asian
Nations) mining conference here.

He said ASEAN growth compared with a forecast 50 percent rise
in demand for metals, primarily for aluminum and copper, from
Korea and Taiwan.

Blackman said the intensity of copper use by the tiger
economies of Taiwan, Hong Kong, South Korea and Singapore
probably peaked in the late 1980s and is unlikely to rise
further.

"ASEAN countries such as Malaysia and Thailand are now joining
the ranks of the tiger economies as their copper intensities are
catching up with the tigers," Blackman said.

"While our forecasts relating to metals demand are positive
for Asia, the rest of the world apart from the U.S. is pretty
lackluster at the moment," Blackman said.

He said the huge metal inventories hanging over many markets,
particularly for aluminum and nickel, dampened the research
house's outlook.

"But ...our cumulative feeling is that we are quietly
optimistic that metal demand will continue to pick up," he said.

Blackman said AME forecasts were based on a proposition tying
physical metal consumption and real gross domestic product. He
said in Malaysia, for example, each one percent rise in GDP
boosts copper demand by 3.22 percent while in the mature economy
of Japan each GDP point rise raises demand by only 0.6 percent.