Europe
With “Initiatives with third regions such as Asia, the Middle East and North Africa” as a guiding slogan, Marubeni’s policy is to focus on new businesses primarily in food, machinery, the environment and infrastructure.
Shingo Tsuda
Managing Executive Officer,
Regional CEO for Europe
Highlights of Operations in the Region (Market) and Initiatives in Fiscal 2010
For its activities in Europe, Marubeni promotes business development through Marubeni Europe and its other overseas offices, and over 20 operating companies. Its involvement spans a diverse range of areas that include North Sea oil field development, electric power wholesale and retail, transportation machinery, agrichemicals, chemical products, industrial materials, food, machinery import and export, and regional sales.
In 2010, the European economy saw better-than-expected growth of 1.8% for the euro-zone as a whole, despite increasingly acute financial problems in southern Europe, as exports from Germany and other major European countries performed strongly. Marubeni's business performance was also firm overall despite the impact of economic weakness on certain transportation machinery-related operations. This outcome mainly reflected inventory adjustments and a recovery in Germany’s export sector.
The EU is continuing to pursue economic alliances with other markets. In this climate, Marubeni's measures for 2010 included, in addition to the enhancement of existing businesses, a focus on both the export of European products and technology to the broader Asian market, rather than primarily to Japan, and the promotion of joint projects in and outside Europe with prominent European companies.
Initiatives in Fiscal 2011
While the possibility of a second bottoming out seems unlikely, growth in the European economy is widely expected to remain modest at best. Factors likely to restrain growth include lingering financial problems in southern Europe, and the full-scale enactment of austerity measures in Germany and other major countries. In fiscal 2011 our aim is to build a stronger earnings base by continuing with measures from fiscal 2010, and also, by utilizing my network as Regional CEO for the Middle East and North Africa, focusing on the development of business linking Europe and the Middle East.
