San Jose, CA - Although textile dyes have emerged as a specialty chemical business, they are still a commodity affected by demand and supply position. Historically, the textile dyes market grew at a lackluster 2% in value terms and 2.3% in volume terms over the period 1995-2005. The market is forecast to experience a CAGR of 4.3% in value terms and 4.6% in volume terms over the next five years. Reactive dyes represents the leading product category, accounting for over 24% of value sales in 2006. Disperse dyes is the second largest segment, with value and volume sales of US$900M and 125 thousand tons respectively.
Asia-Pacific and Europe represent the leading markets, collectively capturing more than 60% share of value sales, as stated by Global Industry Analysts, Inc. Asia-Pacific is also projected to be the fastest growing market, with a CAGR of 5.6% in value terms and 5.4% in volume terms over the next five years.
Textile dyes are used to perform dyeing and printing operations on textiles. Textile dyes could be mainly categorized into two types - natural dyes and synthetic dyes. Textile dyes are primarily employed in the manufacture of apparel, carpets, rugs, and home furnishings. The market for textile dyes is characterized by production overcapacity and declining prices, which has significantly affected profit margins of players.
Stringent environmental control and various other regulatory hurdles have greatly impacted the production of dyestuffs in the developed countries. In the US, Western Europe, and Japan, production of dyestuffs has stagnated as it is considered detrimental to the environment. This has resulted in the shifting of production to low-cost regions of the Asia-Pacific.
Textile dyes market is witnessing pronounced shift from natural dyes to synthetic dyes. Until 1880s, coloring activities on textiles were carried out using natural dyes. Animal residues and vegetative matter are the raw materials used for the extraction of natural dyes. Majority of the natural dyes yield dull shades and possess only reasonable wash fastness. The percentage of toxic effluents released, in the process of synthetic dyeing, could be significantly reduced by the use of natural dyes. But, at present, customers are more inclined towards dazzling colors with darker shades and good wash and light fastness of the synthetic dyes. Moreover, the demand for natural dyes in the European and the US markets recorded a negative growth with the advent of the synthetic dyes.
Currently, the textile industry is involved in the development of new and latest fiber blends to meet the specifications and requirements of the customers. Demand for new dyes is increasing as per the demand of the consumers for enhanced performance from the new materials. Moreover, consumers are very particular about the performance, appearance, color, durability, and quality of the garments, to be purchased.
Leading players in the worldwide textile dyes market include DyStar, Huntsman Corporation, Clariant, Sumitomo Chemical, and Yorkshire Group.
The report titled "Textile Dyes: A Global Strategic Business Report" published by Global Industry Analysts, Inc., analyzes current and future market prospects. Latent demand patterns are quantified across all key geographic markets including US, Canada, Japan, Europe, Asia-Pacific (excluding Japan), Latin America and Rest of World. Volume and value analytics are provided for the above mentioned markets by product segments -- acid dyes, basic dyes, direct dyes, disperse dyes, reactive dyes, sulfur dyes, vat dyes, and other dyes. Also enumerated are recent product launches/innovations, and strategic corporate activity of major market participants across various product segments.
