You would need to turn back to 2008 to find similar production levels in the Italian ceramics industry as those achieved last year: 415 million square meters of fabricated tiles, up 5.4% compared to 2015 and about 50 million square meters more compared to a difficult year in 2009. And there is no trace in the last twenty years of the boom of investments put in place by Italian ceramicists in 2016: €400.4 million, up 14% compared to 2015, the third consecutive record increase.

“And this year, in light of the incentives from the government, a further acceleration is viewed as certain in the process of renewal and repositioning of our manufacturing, which is steering decisively toward the 4.0 ceramic factory model,” said Vittorio Borelli, president of Confindustria Ceramica, previewing the figures of the 2016 statistical investigation presented yesterday afternoon at the annual members’ assembly.