Dow Chemical to close plants, cut 2,400 jobs

Dow Chemical Co., the largest U.S. chemical maker by sales, will cut about 2,400 jobs and shut 20 manufacturing plants to reduce annual costs by $500 million in the face of slow global economic growth.

The facilities to be closed are in the U.S., Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain, the U.K. and Japan, the Midland- based company said in a statement released after it inadvertently emailed a draft copy to Bloomberg News. An additional $500 million will be saved by cutting capital spending and curtailing some investments, Dow said.

The job cuts, which amount to 5 percent of Dow's global workforce, follow DuPont Co.'s announcement Monday that it's eliminating 1,500 jobs in part because of declining demand for paint pigment and solar cells. Dow Chairman and CEO Andrew Liveris said in July the company is operating in the worst conditions since 2009.

"Chemicals are a very economically sensitive industry," Jake Dollarhide, CEO of Tulsa, Oklahoma-based Longbow Asset Management, said in a phone interview. "Economic growth in 2012 has slowed to a trickle, and that has spooked a lot of people."

The job cuts announced by the two largest U.S. chemical makers are a reflection of a global economy still struggling to fully recover from recession, said Dollarhide.

"The reality is we are operating in a slow-growth environment in the near-term," Liveris said in the statement. Annual costs savings should be realized by the end of 2014, Dow said. The reductions won't affect plans for new factories on the U.S. Gulf Coast and in Saudi Arabia, or opportunities in the agriculture and electronics units, the company said.

The facilities to be shut down over the next two years include a polyethylene plastics plant in Belgium, a factory that makes diesel-particulate filters for autos in Michigan and an epoxy resins plant in Japan.

Also closing are factories in Spain, the U.K. and Ohio, that are part of the formulated systems unit, which makes polyurethane foams and epoxy products. A plant in the Netherlands also will close.

Dow is scheduled to release third-quarter earnings Thursday.

Source: http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20121024/BIZ/210240321/1001/rss21

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