Per capita shoe consumption surprise
06/10/2011
These surprising facts emerged from the World Footwear Yearbook 2011, published in September by Apiccaps, the Portuguese Footwear Industry Association.
Taking into account all sales of all types of shoes, Apiccaps included in the yearbook a table showing the top ten shoe consuming countries in the world in 2010. The table concentrated on total volume, giving a top ten of (in descending order) China, the US, India, Brazil,Japan, Indonesia, the UK, Spain, France and Germany.
Together, these markets accounted for 62% of global consumption in 2010, Apiccaps said, a combined total of 10.9 billion pairs for the ten countries.
Further analysis reveals that Spain and the UK had the highest per capita consumption figures. Both are struggling to achieve economic growth and have governments urging caution and austerity. In Spain's case at least, financial problems are attracting serious concern from many observers of the global economy. Nevertheless, the Apiccaps report suggests that, on average, people in Spain bought 9.3 pairs of shoes each in 2010, 427 million pairs in total.
The UK consumed 504 million pairs during 2010, with each person in the country buying an average of 8.1 pairs of shoes during the year. The US came third, buying an average of 7.5 pairs of shoes per capita (and consuming 2.3 billion pairs of shoes), followed by France, where people bought an average of 6.3 pairs of shoes each during 2010 (and consumed 415 million pairs during the year).
Japan consumed 693 million pairs of shoes during 2010, or an average of 5.4 pairs per capita. Germany came next, consuming 385 million pairs and buying an average of 4.7 pairs each. Brazilian people bought an average of 4.1 pairs of shoes per capita, while, of the big ten shoe-consuming countries, Indonesia, China and India bought the fewest pairs per capita, at 2.6, 2.0 and 1.7 pairs respectively (although Apiccaps's figure for consumption in China is lower than one published by World Footwear magazine earlier this year).
The figures include all shoes bought in each country in 2010; there is no way of knowing how many pairs were bought by visitors to rather than citizens of the country concerned.
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