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U.S. exports of recovered paper were down 19.5%, to roughly 5.8 million mt, in the January-May 2023 period compared with the same period last year, according to data from the U.S. International Trade Commission and ISRI.
The top-10 importing countries bought a total of 5.4 million mt of U.S. recovered paper through May 2023—16.3% less than in the comparable 2022 period. Only one top-10 country—Thailand—imported more U.S. recovered paper through May this year, with its 989,607 mt of U.S. imports representing a gain of 42.4% over last year’s January-May total. India—the largest importer of U.S. recovered fiber—cut its purchases of U.S. recovered fiber 36.3% through May this year, to about 1.2 million mt, representing the highest decrease among top-10 importing countries.
By grade, only U.S. bleached chemical pulp and high-grade deinking posted higher export totals in the January-May 2023 period at 254,326 mt (up 34.6%) and 643,516 mt (up 11.5%), respectively. All other grades saw lower exported tonnage through May, with paper pulp fiber suffering the highest percentage decline of almost 39%, to 131,940 component tons, and OCC/unbleached kraft seeing the highest tonnage decline of just over 1 million mt.
Container ship photo by Rinson Chory from Unsplash.
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