Malaysia's exports of rubber products continued to be 'durian runtuh' following the encouraging increase in demand for rubber gloves.
The surge has also supported Malaysia's rubber product exports to increase by around 80% to reach RM74 billion this year compared to last year's RM41 billion.
According to Bernama, the improving global economic activity has brightened the prospects for demand for natural rubber. Global consumption of natural rubber increased by 6.7% to 13.7 million tonnes in 2021 compared to 2020 which had declined by 7.8%.
In addition, the Covid-19 vaccination program has spurred adoption in key markets such as China and the United States to continue to show positive improvement following the reopening of business operations.
He also added that with the significant increase in daily Covid-19 cases in Malaysia and the implementation of movement control, the reduction of manpower and so on will result in a stagnant natural rubber supply chain.
Meanwhile, Malaysia's natural rubber exports are expected to increase by around 5% to RM6.5 billion from only RM6.2 billion recorded in 2020 and also supported by better rubber prices.
Following the trend of rubber production in 2021, it continued to strengthen to 530,000 tonnes from 514,700 in the same period last year.
