The slowdown in the road projects, coupled with degrowth in the mining sector has negatively impacted the demand for wheel loaders. However, the industry is hopeful that after the election, things may look up and the anticipated opening up of the mining sector and new projects in the road sector will boost demand.

The wheel loader market though have come down to 1,200 in 2013 compared to 2,000 units in 2012, given the quantum of projects? be it in the mining sector, material handling in the ports and wagon filling, and road projects? the long term growth perspective seems to be intact. Trend towards specific-application based equipment, and a shift towards ?more value added services? comes in handy for the growth of the wheel loader market.

According to Abhijit Gupta, Managing Director, CASE New Holland Construction Equipment, the current overall demand is down in 2014 across verticals. The wheel loader segment for construction continues to remain low thus far into 2014 whereas for the mining sector, it further dipped in 2014 due to the slowdown in mining. On a positive note he adds, ?Opening up the mining sector will boost the demand for wheel loaders. In ports, we expect that once the economy picks up and the traffic in ports also picks up, the demand for the wheel loader will pick up.?

H V Kulkarni, Director - Marketing, XCMG Machinery (India) says, ?The industry estimated that the wheel loader market will cross 2,000 machines last year but actually, the total machines sold during this period is about 1,200. So it is 40 per cent less than expected. This was mainly due to the dismal performance of the mining and road sectors. The machines which were purchased the previous year were standing idle. In the ports sector also, less handling of coal affected the use of wheel loaders. Kulkarni adds, ?Currently, the supply is more. The people who were manufacturing in India have pruned down their production. We used to import and keep stocks to respond immediately to the customer?s requirement. Now we have stopped keeping stocks because of low demand.?

Speaking about the move towards value-added features in the wheel loader market, Gupta says, ?The large-sized wheel loader with more than a 5-tonne payload is where the clients would be willing to opt for technologies like automatic transmission and electronic controls for the engine. The customers will pay for features and demand them once the benefits are seen. The cooling box in the CASE wheel loader, the hydraulic joy sticks for controls, are some of the features which the market is bound to appreciate.?

Summing up the situation, Kulkarni says,?This year saw a negative growth for wheel loaders. However, if things go well after a new government comes to power, there can be 20 per cent growth in the next five years starting 2015. This year will be the period to stabilise things. By 2015, the mining and road sectors should pick up, with scope for wheel loaders to grow.?