MPA mineral products industry review
Mineral Products Association publishes updated profile of the UK mineral products industry
THE Mineral Products Association (MPA) has published the 4th edition of its review of the mineral products industry, which celebrates the diversity of the sector and highlights its essential role as an enabling industry for others to thrive on.
The profile provides industry stakeholders with a unique source of information and metrics to illustrate the way the UK produces and consumes minerals and the manufactured products derived from them. With government reducing support for data collection and consolidation relating to minerals, the MPA says this review will help fill the gap.
Presenting detailed analysis of the latest data for each of the industry’s products, the review highlights the significant turnover contribution of £18 billion the sector made to the UK economy in 2016. It employed 74,000 people at more than 2,000 active sites and plants, and supported an additional 3.5 million jobs throughout the supply chain.
Key statistics (2016) from the review include:
- 390 million tonnes: GB production of aggregates and manufactured mineral products
- £18 billion: Annual turnover for the mineral products industry
- £6.8 billion: Gross value added generated by the industry
- £513 billion: Annual turnover of the industries supplied by the sector
- £152 billion: Value of construction, the mineral industry’s main customer
- 74,000: People employed in the industry
- 3.5 million: Jobs supported in the minerals industry supply chain.
The review confirms the scale and importance of the mineral products industry. With around 390 million tonnes of aggregates, asphalt, cement, concrete and other mineral products supplied in Great Britain in 2016, the industry generates more than four times the total volume of all energy minerals combined.
Further headlines include:
- The UK mineral products industry is highly productive: each worker produced about £92,000 in 2016, equivalent to 1.7 times the national average
- In 2017, primary aggregates sales totalled 133 million tonnes in England, 17 million tonnes in Wales, 29 million tonnes in Scotland, and 24 million tonnes in Northern Ireland
- Further growth in house building and the planned delivery in infrastructure projects over the next two to three years should support further growth in mineral and mineral product demand
- Recycled and secondary materials accounted for 29% of the GB aggregates market in 2016, putting the country at the forefront of the circular economy
- The UK cement industry is a world leader in carbon reduction, having reduced its direct CO2 emissions by 25% between 1998 and 2016.
Commenting on the review, MPA chief executive Nigel Jackson said: ‘The mineral products industry works hard to provide essential and economically, socially and environmentally sustainable materials to build our economy and improve our quality of life. Current infrastructure and housing development are directly dependent on these products.
‘This review provides a wealth of detail about mineral products that everyone in the UK needs, but too few understand. It helps to make the link between quarries, rail freight, wharves and added-value operations and their use. Hopefully, this updated review will help raise awareness of our sector’s essentiality to the economy and the UK.’
A copy of the review – ‘Profile of the UK Mineral Products Industry - Edition 2018’ – is attached below.
