Foundation of Ipocork - Indústria de Pavimentos e Decoração, S.A. (now known as Amorim Cork Flooring) marks Corticeira Amorim’s entry into the parquet and flooring market.
There is a change in the Portuguese cork sector’s production mix. Half of the exported raw material is already industrially processed in Portugal, representing 75% of the value of all Portuguese cork exports. Maintaining its position as the leader of the cork industry, Portugal assumes that it is above all a cork processing country, in the wake of a process that dates back to the early 1960s. The district of Aveiro, where Corticeira Amorim’s head operations are based, becomes Portugal’s biggest cork stopper production centre - responsible for about 75% of national production.
The first cork processing plant outside Portugal is set up in the world’s second most important cork oak forest region, the Mediterranean coast of Africa: Comatral - Compagnie Marocaine de Transformation du Liège, SA, based in Skhirat, Morocco.