Prospects for the flexo printing market in Asia (1)

I. Overview of the flexo printing market in Asia as a whole
In recent years, the flexographic-related industries in Europe and America have greatly assisted the Asian region. At the same time, they have also introduced flexographic technology into the vast Asian region and opened up the market. In the future, this trend will be further developed and will affect the Japanese market. Therefore, it is necessary to pay attention to the trend of the Japanese market. In the products manufactured in the Far East and Southeast Asia, the packaging materials are printed by flexo printing and exported to Japan. The following brief introduction from several aspects.
1, print quality. Under the influence of Japan, the quality of flexo printing in East Asia continues to increase. Today, the view that the quality of flexo printing is not high is gradually away from us. That is to say, although in the past printing on plastic film was based on gravure printing, today, along with the introduction of the latest flexographic presses produced in Europe and the United States, resin plates and ceramic meshes necessary for improving the quality of flexo printing are added. The rapid development of rollers, sleeves, inks, etc., flexo printing has also been advancing rapidly in recent years.
2, printing materials and infrastructure. The highest speed is 50-100m/min when using gravure for high quality printing on stretched polyethylene (PE) plastic film, and even if the printing speed is above 300m/min when printing with CI flexo printing machine Can ensure the accuracy of registration. Therefore, for Indian printers who are looking for high-quality printing and can print on all plastic films, flexo has certain advantages.
In Asia, the infrastructure of the flexo system has been set up. At the same time, high-quality printing plates and inks have begun to be supplied. At present, they are working to supply flexographic plates that are much cheaper than gravure plates.
3, cheap flexographic printing presses and labor costs. In Asia, flexographic presses made in Hong Kong and Taiwan are already on the market. These machines are much cheaper than the gravure presses produced in Europe and America.
On the other hand, in Asia, PE plastic films are also packaged using simple packaging machines that are semi-automatically or manually operated. In flexo printing, CI flexographic printing machines are used to double the cylindrical plastic film at the same time. print. This virtually reduces labor costs.
4, circulation market. Along with the development of supermarkets, packaging also tends to develop in the direction of small batches and short delivery times. In addition, the design style of packaging has also been frequently changed, and in Asia, it has begun to realize that flexo printing can adapt to this development trend (short delivery time).
In the past 10 years, in some large supermarkets in Asia, a large number of polyethylene (PE) plastic films have been used to pack daily necessities, frozen foods, salads, and other products. As an ideal packaging method, polypropylene (PP) plastic film has been applied to the packaging of food and pasta products. Especially in Malaysia, polyethylene (PE) plastic film packaging has been used for the packaging of sliced ​​bread, which also promotes flexo printing. A driving force for high quality development.
Second, the development trend of flexography in all parts of Asia
1. Mainland China. With a population of 1.2 billion, China has huge market potential. The social and economic situation of the entire country has undergone rapid changes. About 50% of China's packaging materials, labels, and other related printed materials are paper materials. The most widely developed market for flexo printing is the corrugated paper box market, especially the quality of corrugated boxes for export. The paper container (carton) industry has developed faster. From 1995 to 2000, cartons and paper container production machinery introduced 200 production lines. In the area of ​​bag making, 5.8 billion cement bags were produced in 1996, which is 3-4 times that of Japan.
In China, the field of flexible packaging will be a direction for future flexographic growth. In the absence of raw materials, high barrier plastic films, etc. must rely on imports, the raw materials are rapidly developing toward plastics.
Technical books and technical personnel training institutions on flexo printing are still lacking in China, and the spread of knowledge and technology is slow. After 1995, with assistance from Europe and the United States, education on flexo technology has already begun in some universities in Shanghai and Beijing.
Currently in Guangdong, Shanghai and other places in China, there are already several printing press manufacturers producing simple online and unit type flexographic printing presses and exporting to countries such as Vietnam and North Korea. China's flexographic printing has made remarkable progress in the past five years, and the flexographic market accounted for nearly 7% of the entire printing market.
2, South Korea. In Korea's flexo printing market, there are more than a dozen sets of high-precision CI type flexographic printing presses produced in Europe and the United States. The accuracy of the domestic flexographic printing presses is also increasing. The development of resin plate making technology and prepress technology is flourishing. In the printing of corrugated boxes, bags, labels, and flexible packaging (materials used in packaging “diapers” like the Japanese market), flexographic printing has become popular.
In early 1998, in order to support the flexo printing industry in South Korea, a flexographic printing college with a prepress service was established. The reason why this association was established is that at that time there was no suitable flexo printing technology in Korea.
In this move, European and American companies introduced resin plate devices to the association. Especially in the corrugated box industry, plates with a thickness of 7 mm are generally used. In order to improve the printing quality, in the market, it has begun to introduce 3.94mm printing plates to some enterprises and some fields. At the same time, certain improvements have also been made in the beautification of corrugated flexo printing.
3, Thailand. In 1998, with the aid of European and American companies, the famous printing (image) education institution in Thailand and the Chulklarkun University, which has a master's degree program in printing, set up a flexo printing platemaking center to formally conduct education on flexo printing. In addition, after the year 1998, a flexo platemaking exhibition was also held in Thailand. Prior to this, Thailand did not have the infrastructure for flexo printing. With regard to flexible packaging flexo printing, Thailand still belongs to a still open field. (To be continued)