The global market for crawlers above 2,000 tonnes capacity have declined in recent months but demand for machines in the 1,000 tonnes to 1,700 tonnes range is relatively strong. However, despite growth in emerging markets the global market still on a downward trend.

Middle East Liebherr’s Mobile Harbour Crane Division’s deliveries dropped with Liebherr delivering just 2 units to Saudi Arabia. The German company reported that the maritime business was actually suffering greatly from the lack of investment by our customers. However, the first delivery to Saudi Arabia since 2003 was found to be fundamentally good.

Despite the company bemoaning what it sees as a lack of investment quite a lot of money has gone into redeveloping seaports notably Jeddah in Saudi Arabia but also Salalah in Oman received significant quantities of cranes in both cases sourced from the Chinese manufacturer Shanghai Zhenhua Heavy Industry Company Limited better known as ZPMC.

Mr Mike Maruo of Kobelco said that there are projects globally which can expect crane requirements but most of them are still in a wait and see situation for various reasons, particularly the Middle East with mega projects in Saudi Arabia, Australian gas projects, USA wind power generation, infrastructure, etc. On the other hand, the markets in emerging countries, such as India, are still expanding based on aggressive investments for energy related industries and infrastructure.

One of these emerging countries is of course, China. In August 2010, Off Highway Research said that crawler crane sales showed spectacular growth in the country with a total market of 650 units or 1.6 times the level of sales achieved in the same period of 2009.

(Sourced from Construction Week Online)