IPA to submit budget memorandum to the government for faster growth in the paint sector

Mumbai: The Indian Paint Association's (IPA) three-day 22nd 'Indian paint conference and exhibition 2005, got under way at the Grand Hyatt, Mumbai.

Over a thousand delegates from 250 paint, raw material suppliers and allied industries from India and overseas are attending this event.

According to Jalaj Dani, convenor of the conference, told the press at a press briefing that this was largest ever delegation for the IPA conference. "The exhibition held in concurrent with the conference has attracted over 80 companies from all parts of the world," hae added.

PK Khanna, president, IPA said "The paint industry is probably the only sector in the country which has posted growth every year after liberalisation of the economy and we are confident that the sector will continue to grow in this decade."

The Rs6,000 crore Indian paint market is estimated to be around one million tonnes by volume, with 70 per cent comprising architectural paints and 30 per cent for industrial paints. In 2003-04, the paint industry grew by 12 per cent, though during the current financial year, growth slowed to around 9 per cent.

The recent price rise in crude oil has increased the industry's input costs for raw materials and containers. Raw material costs have increased between 15 per cent to 50 per cent, with petroleum solvents such as, mineral turpentine oil have increased by 35 per cent.

This increase in input costs has affected small scale paint manufacturers who have been unable to increase the prices of the finished products proportionately, thus affecting their margins.