ABSTRACT
The first seven chapters in this book, concentrating on the past, sought answers to two important and perplexing questions initially raised in chapter 1. The first is why—even after controlling for economic size—such large differences in metal consumption have arisen among the three groups of countries studied here—OECD countries, the developing countries, and the centrally planned economies, as well as among individual countries within these groups. A second major area of inquiry has been why world metal demand has grown so much more slowly, and in some cases even stagnated, since the early 1970s. This final chapter, drawing on findings presented in previous chapters, focuses on the future of world metal demand. It considers where the major metal markets of tomorrow are likely to be and assesses the extent to which the developing countries or possibly the centrally planned economies will replace the OECD countries as the world’s major metal consumers. It also addresses the related matters of the pace of future growth in metal demand and the factors that will govern this growth.
