The price of plastic raw materials has been on a roller-coaster ride due to the COVID-19 pandemic, plunging to a near 10-year low during the widespread lockdown last May. Since the end of last year, the price of raw materials such as polyethylene and polypropylene, which are used in the production of plastic products, has jumped by 25% in Europe in a short period, reaching a near six-year high, as factories gradually resumed work.

In addition, the European plastics market, which is highly dependent on imported raw materials, is also facing a crisis of supply shortage. One of its largest suppliers, the United States, has suffered a precipitous decline in total output due to a number of disastrous weather and other factors that disrupted power and material supplies for a long time. The epidemic also disrupted the global supply chain, the shortage of containers, logistics congestion and other complex situations, making the European plastics industry generally expected that the crisis is difficult to solve in a short time.