IRSG, IISRP to collaborate on statistics, forecasts for SR

London and Houston--Two major statistical research groups are to collaborate on the gathering of statistics and the subsequent analysis to develop long-term forecasts for the synthetic rubber industry.

In a joint statement, the International Institute of Synthetic Rubber Producers Inc. (IISRP) and the International Rubber Study Group (IRSG) said they would co-operate on Synthetic Rubber long-term forecasting.

The IRSG and IISRP boards have both accepted a proposal that both organisations would collaborate over the next 12 months in the area of statistics and forecasting, with activities encompassing the following areas:

• The IRSG's long-range forecasting model would be augmented so as to develop SR forecasts for production, consumption and required capacity by key elastomer types;
• In addition to projections for natural rubber (NR), the key elastomers to be considered would be

• styrene-butadiene rubber (SBR),
• polybutadiene rubber (BR),
• Polyisoprene rubber (IR);
• Ethylene-propylene rubber (EPDM),
• Butyl rubber (IIR),
• Nitrile rubber (NBR) and
• Polychloroprene rubber (CR).

• Additional products may be incorporated into the programme at a later date;

• In preparing forecasts, back-data for SR, provided by the IISRP, would be used to build a consistent industry-wide and worldwide platform of figures for SR by type;

• In terms of the aggregate data on SR, IRSG data - which includes SR-latices and carbon-black masterbatch (CBM) - would be utilised, so as to maintain consistency with current statistical reporting of the Group.

The two organisations said, "It is envisaged that projections available from the model will cover both NR and SR in one document. Forecasts for all types of SR will be issued in the same format, at the same time, in one document, based on the same database and will provide a valuable new tool for readers, press, governments, downstream users, general public etc., which was not available before.

In the past, both organisations have commented that the other collects statistics in a different way, and this has resulted in a different picture of the world rubber industry emerging from each of the two organisations. In January of this year, Hidde Smit took over as secretary-general of the IRSG. Smit is well known as an economist, and for creating mathematical models of the world rubber industry. The predictive accuracy of such models is heavily dependent on the data put into the model.

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IRSG website(Origin) story

IISRP website