September crude steel production up 2%

China’s crude steel production was 68.2 million t, an increase of 3.9% on September 2015, according to worldsteel, accounting for just over 51% of the global total.

Japan, the world’s second-largest steel producer, recorded crude steel output of 8.4 million t, a year-on-year fall of 1.5%, while South Korea produced 5.7 million t, 1.1% up on last year.

In the EU, year-on-year production was down in Germany and Italy. French production rose 2.2% to 1.3 million t. Outside of the EU, Turkey registered strong production growth of 8.1% to record output of 2.7 million t. Russian and Ukrainian production was down by 2.1% and 8%, respectively.

Across the Atlantic, US steel production was also down by 3.8% at 6.3 million t. Brazil’s crude steel production was up 3.1%, however, at 2.6 million t.

For the nine months to September 2016, global crude steel production 0.5% down on the same period in 2015 at 1.197 billion t. Asia accounted for 825.9 million t of production, an increase of 0.6%. Output in the EU (121.3 million t), North America (83.9 million t) and the CIS (76.4 million t) was down by 4.8%, 1.4% and 0.1%, respectively.