Manufacturers expect record investments

• Investment forecasts for 2008 adjusted upward
• Robust growth of the chemical industry

The entrepreneurs in the manufacturing industry expect an 11 percent increase in investments on 2007. They are far more optimistic than they were in the autumn of 2007, when they expected investments in 2008 to grow by 4 percent. For 2008, almost all sectors of industry are optimistic about investments, with the exception of the oil refining industry.

When the planned investments are carried out, 2008 will become a record year for industry with 9.1 billion euro in investments. The previous record investments were in 1997, when investments amounted to 8.8 billion euro, according to the figures of Statistics Netherlands.

The entrepreneurs in the chemical industry were most positive. They expect to invest about 42 percent more in 2008 than in 2007. The entrepreneurs in the oil refining industry are far more modest in their expectations. They expect a drop of no less than 32 percent in investments in their sector.
Just like the entrepreneurs in the manufacturing industry, the entrepreneurs in extraction and the energy sector plan to invest more in 2008 than in the previous year. They expect investments to rise by 21 and 6 percent respectively.