Chemical industry worldwide 2008

In year 2008 the global economic crisis had been affecting chemical industry very much.The serious shrink of demands on chemical products had resulted in the massive go-down of chemical production in North America,Europe and Asia,and decreased the profits of majority of chemical companies.But the sales of global chemicals still had a 2.2% increase in 2008,reaching 3.18 trillion US dollars,with a continuous improvement in chemical trades.The capital and RD expenditures of American and European companies had kept their rising,and of Japanese companies the capital expenditure had shown a great drop while the RD expenditure had a fine mount-up.Numbers of persons employed in chemical companies in Canada,Europe and Japan had increased,but decreased in American companies.