Coldstore capacity in India greater than USA
14th January 2015
USA: India now has more cold storage capacity than the USA, according to the latest report from International Association of Refrigerated Warehouses (IARW).
According to the IARW, the total capacity of refrigerated warehouses worldwide reached 552 million m³ in 2014, an increase of 20% on 2012.
Describing the contents of the 2014 Global Cold Storage Capacity Report, Corey Rosenbusch, president and CEO of partner organisation the Global Cold Chain Alliance (GCCA), said: “It’s really interesting to see India surpass the United States in total cold storage capacity with 131 million m³ of space, compared to 115 million m³ for the United States.”
China now has the third largest storage capacity with 76 million m³ of space.
Written by Dr Victoria Salin, a professor in the Department of Agricultural Economics at Texas A&M University, the 42-page report includes analyses on growth trends in global capacity, market development indicators, and characteristics of refrigerated warehouses around the world.
The report features cold storage market data on 58 countries. During the last two years, approximately 17 million m3 of additional refrigerated warehouse capacity has been added to the IARW database from eight additional countries and nine more international cold storage companies which are now contributing data.
New countries covered in the 2014 report include Egypt, Iran, Kuwait, Libya, El Salvador, Afghanistan, Dominican Republic, and Oman.
Cold storage capacity has shown a growth rate above 5% per year during a sustained period of time in 17 countries. The long-term growth rates are highest in India, China, and Turkey.
Capacity in 13 countries grew faster than 10% annually since the financial crisis of 2008. Countries leading the growth rates since 2008 are Turkey, India, Peru, and China.
The survey found that household income is the main driver of global growth in refrigerated warehousing. The increase in household purchasing power is accompanied by changes in preferences favouring large-scale shopping formats such as supermarkets and hypermarkets.
The market share of modern retail sales is 50% or greater in most of the large emerging markets (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa and Turkey) and is growing approximately 10-12% per year. Those markets also have the most rapid expansion in refrigerated warehouse capacity.
“While retailing sectors are the direct business connections between temperature-controlled warehousing and consumers in any country, the status of the transportation system is an enabling condition for both retailing and distribution,” Salin says. “Market penetration of the refrigerated warehouse industry in the surveyed countries was found to be positively associated with the transportation quality index published by the World Economic Forum.”
The 2014 IARW Global Cold Storage Capacity Report is available to IARW members as a benefit of membership and for a fee to non-members.
For further information visit www.gcca.org.
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