Brick production in the UK is likely to sink below 2 billion bricks this year for what is believed to be the first time since the forties, writes Sarah Richardson. As the dramatic fall in housing continues to hit manufacturers, experts are predicting that brick production, which was at 1 billion for the first six months of the year, will drop further for the second half. The total for 2007 was 2.4 billion. In addition, the largest brickmaking firms in the UK are understood to have privately estimated that between them they will only be able to sell 1.6 billion bricks in the forthcoming year. Michael Ankers, chief executive of the Construction Products Association, said: "The scale and the size of the reduction doesn't surprise me. It's a fairly catastrophic figure. It's not surprising, given the dramatic fall in housing starts, but there are no early signs of recovery."
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