SBWire

Health and wellness as well as demand for convenience continued to be strong trends in soup and to influence significantly the current retail value growth of soup in 2012. Consumers paid attention to health and nutrition as well as convenience due to their hectic lifestyles. Increased consumer confidence and growth in the level of disposable income of consumers led to trading up to mid-priced and premium products, for example frozen soup and fortified dehydrated soup.

Bottled water volume sales declined by 6% in 2012, undermined by cold and rainy summer weather, the uncertain economic situation as well as the raised sweet tax.

Many of the appliances categorised under air treatment products tend to use a lot of energy when in use. In Colombia, energy prices vary from city to city. In the cities on the Atlantic Coast where the weather is very hot, air treatment appliances such as air conditioners and cooling fans are essential household equipment. As utility bills in these cities can be quite high, the leading retailers of air conditioners in this part of Colombia now tend to stock only high-efficiency air...

The weak economic climate had a negative impact on sales results in 2012. Despite this, there are indications of growth opportunity within jeans. Market players report that despite a decrease in sales value for premium and super-premium jeans, there remains a strong customer base for these products as consumers view them as an investment and an important basic clothing item for their wardrobes. Market players also highlight a growing consumer demand for organic and environmentally-friendly...

Depilatories witnessed current value growth of 6% in 2012, down from 10% growth in 2011. The significant slowdown in growth can be attributed to gloomy economic development and decelerating economic growth in China in 2012. Meanwhile, other factors also contributed to less robust growth, such as because less body hair for most Chinese women compared with their Western counterparts, depilatories is still under consumer education stage with lower consumer conception on depilatories. Some...

Traditional steam irons continued to account for the majority of volume sales of irons in 2012, as these products are more convenient and lighter than traditional dry irons. Thus, there was a gradual shift from traditional dry irons to steam irons, as the former saw a decline in volume share in 2012. On the other hand, garment steamers is seeing a higher take-up rate, despite being priced higher than traditional irons.

During 2012, Strauss Group launched Danacol, a new functional drinking yoghurt brand. This new drinking yoghurt is the first in Israel with to contain cholesterol reducing attributes which have been recommended by doctors. It is claimed that, when used daily, Danacol lowers LDL cholesterol in the bloodstream. There is a high awareness among the Israeli population of the negative implications of high LDL cholesterol levels. According to a Brandman consumer survey conducted in 2012, 74% of the...

Despite the uncertainty in local economic conditions, especially for exports, new housing developments and the real estate market in Taiwan sustained a growth trend in 2012. Influenced by this trend, home improvement and gardening stores experienced growth, up 5% in retail value terms in 2012.

BMI View: Despite the risk of some limited short-term political uncertainty, we still perceive South Africa as offering extremely attractive investment opportunities for hotel groups and other tourist-related industries - largely due to rising domestic tourism and regional tourism, supported by an increase in higher disposable incomes.

In 2012, the beauty and personal care industry continued to show strong growth at levels similar to the review period. The more stable economic situation in the country helped the industry maintain a constant but high growth in 2012. However, it grew slightly slower than in 2010 and 2011, but this was mostly because in those two previous years the industry had large growth rates as it was recovering from past import restrictions. Unit prices in general remained quite stable, as they basically...

RTD coffee sales remained negligible in Belarus in 2012.

Men's grooming in Costa Rica is a beauty and personal care category which is currently subject to strong development as the category's leading companies respond to the latest research into the personal grooming needs of Latin American men, especially with regards to men's skin care products. It has recently become known that there are remarkable differences between male and female human skin. For this reason, new product development in men's skin care is moving towards more male-specific...

BMI have become a little more optimistic about Bulgaria's economic outlook over the last three months. We have revised up our estimate for 2012 GDP growth to 0.4% (from 0.1% previously) and we are now forecasting GDP expansion of 1.5% in 2013. The change reflects a better-than-expected performance in H212, the emergence of what looks like a modest recovery in the eurozone, and domestic factors such as a more expansive fiscal policy ahead of parliamentary elections due in mid-2013. On the external front we expect export growth to accelerate to 5.4% in 2013 as the eurozone returns to growth. Although import growth will also pick up somewhat in response to the pickup in investment, this will be offset by the better export performance.

Following an estimated 5.3% expansion in 2012, we forecast Kazakh real GDP growth will reach 5.8% in 2013. A recovery in the agricultural sector combined with strong investment and consumer spending will drive growth higher this year. Kazakhstan remains an attractive destination for foreign investment due to its vast natural resources wealth, a good location to export to high growth markets in Asia, and a steadily improving business environment. We see a lot of room for growth across many sectors, particularly alcohol and food retailing. Multinationals led by Nestle, Turkey-based Ulker and possibly a range of companies in neighbouring Russia, are likely to scale up investment, particularly with much of emerging Europe no longer as attractive on the consumer side following the global financial crisis.

BMI View: Oman's mobile, fixed-line and internet sectors recorded strong growth in 2012. We attribute this to strong private consumption growth, driven by the Omani government's expansionary budget and increases in public sector wages. However, the market is limited by the country's small population size and is approaching saturation for some services, notably basic voice (fixed and mobile) services. We therefore expect operators to shift their strategy towards up-selling higher-value services to existing customers in order to sustain revenue growth.

Mozambique will be one of the major growth stories in the global mining sector over the coming years as a combination of enormous coal reserves and sound business environment coalesce to provide rapid growth in output. We expect the value of the country's mining sector will reach US$735mn in 2017, from US$178mn in 2011. This growth supports our bullish view for the Mozambican economy and will see the mining sector rise from 1.5% of GDP in 2011 to 2.9% in 2017. Almost all of the country's coal production will be exported and thus the country will become a key driver of export growth in future, with India and China the main destinations. While the outlook for the sector is positive, concerns remain surrounding the capacity of the country's freight transport infrastructure to cope with the projected increase in mineral production over the next few years. Attempts to increase freight capacity have so far been met with considerable complications.

We view the current year as being fraught with challenges for the Slovenian consumer, with the recent political turmoil adding to the uncertainty. Real GDP contracted by 2.9% year-on-year (y-o-y) in Q312, putting the economy back into a serious recession. Significantly, household consumption fell 2.5% y-o-y, all but halting the trend of premiumisation. At the same time, the unemployment rate remains severely elevated - at around 12%, the figure is almost double the rate seen back in late 2008. In fact, employment prospects are unlikely to improve, with corporates focused on deleveraging and eurozone economic activity proving lacklustre, which will continue to depress demand for higher-end food and beverages..

The Poland real estate report examines the office, retail, industrial and construction sectors in the country in the context of the downturn in the construction segment.

Following a year in which BMI believes saw muted growth in some and decreasing volumes in other freight transport modes in Russia, 2013 will signal better growth dynamics and new historic highs in some of the modes.

The Chile Retail Report examines the long-term potential of the local consumer market, but flags short-term concerns about the impact on Chile's economic outlook of high labour costs, a moderation in external demand and a fiscally conservative government.

LDP Hits The Accelerator - But Growth To Remain Sluggish

Strong economic growth, the business-friendly operating environment and increasing domestic demand in Peru will provide revenue-earning opportunities for multinational pharmaceutical and healthcare companies. The potential local currency depreciation in the medium term will also benefit companies using Peru as a production hub to export to neighbouring countries. The strict regulatory standards in Peru are also to the advantage of multinationals, which can leverage their industrial expertise in production and reduce competition from local companies. However, challenges – in the form of price cuts in the prescription drug sector – remain, as the government aims for cost-containment.

Ognjenovicn in September 2012 and forwarding of the case to the prosecutor's office for organised crime later last year.

The Saudi Arabian Retail Report examines the long-term potential of the local consumer market, but flags short-term concerns about the impact of a possible cutback in government spending on Saudi Arabia's economic outlook should the fiscal and current account position deteriorate.

The Ministry of Health announced this quarter it would increase 2013 drug manufacturing prices by a maximum of 5.8% in the private sector. This is below expectations, and in addition to the continued depreciation of the Rand, should be seen as an opportunity for local drugmakers to shift focus towards increasing exports to emerging markets in order to drive long-term revenues. Although the government favours local drugmakers in tender allocations, increasing generic drug competition and downward pressure on drug prices, due to the influx of Indian and Chinese drugmakers, will see key players like Aspen Pharmacare struggle to maintain local market share.