The healthy state of MEWP rental and positive economic trends to year-end 2019 in countries including Italy, the Netherlands, Germany, and China should shape strong recoveries after the coronavirus pandemic, according to the latest analysis. The report was conducted exclusively for the International Powered Access Federation (IPAF) by DuckerFrontier.
The newly published Global Powered Access Rental Market Report 2020 shows that the countries least hard-hit in the first wave of the pandemic are likely to recover well in 2021. The report also indicates Sweden and the U.S. will be among markets to recover strongly after construction sites largely stayed open during the peak of the pandemic.
France, the UK, Spain, and Finland were among those worst hit by the pandemic, due to the impact of the disease and sustained national lockdowns, coupled with other underlying factors contributing to economic uncertainty, including Brexit and national elections. Outlooks are not favorable for a rapid recovery in any of these countries.
International Powered Access Federation (IPAF)
In Europe, the Dutch and German MEWP rental markets both reported strong growth right up until the beginning of the pandemic, increasing by 7 percent in terms of annual revenue. Meanwhile, France saw sustained growth over three years, to overtake the UK MEWP rental market in terms of size and revenue at the end of 2019. Spain and Italy matched France in 2019, growing revenue by around 5 percent. Denmark’s total market revenue was up 3 percent in 2018, but the UK and Finland reported no revenue growth, which was below the 4 percent average.
In the U.S., the market continues to grow and mature, boosted by strong construction output in 2019. However, the market evolution has been halted by a piecemeal approach to containing the pandemic in 2020, followed by uncertainty caused by national elections at the end of the year and the fall-out thereafter. There is hope for a clearer political outlook and a renewed focus on controlling Covid-19, including the availability of an effective vaccine, which can lay the groundwork for a relatively rapid bounce-back in 2021 and beyond.
As in 2019, the report also contains a special market focus on China this year and paints a picture of a MEWP rental market growing at unprecedented speeds, only slightly restricted by the coronavirus pandemic, and set to keep surging in terms of fleet size and market penetration for years to come. In 2019, overall MEWP rental market value grew by 38 percent; while this rate of growth is unlikely to be replicated in 2020, it is still set to rise by 10 percent — the exact opposite of some of the worst-affected European markets.
