All Time High For Stainless Steel Production
Figures which have been preliminary released by the International Stainless Steel Forum (ISSF) have shown that stainless steel production for the third quarter is extremely strong and has set an all time high.
Worldwide stainless steel crude steel production has in fact increased by 3.6% in just the first nine months of 2011 when compared to the corresponding time during 2010. It was accumulated that 24.4 million metric tons (mmt) was produced in 2011 and then in the third quarter production reached 7.7 mmt which is a new all time high.
Although this is really good to hear and positive for the stainless steel industry there are still huge differences between the production outputs of various countries. With the exclusion of China, stainless steel production in Asia decreased by 1.9% to 6.6 mmt for the first nine months of 2011.
Individual stainless steel producing countries within Asia showed variations ranging from plus 10% in India to minus 33% in Taiwan. Mainland China showed an increase in its stainless steel production by 12.8% to 9.4 mmt. At the end of the third quarter it was both Asia inclusive of China which accounted for two thirds of the world’s stainless steel production.
Other countries are shown in the table below:
Table 1: Stainless crude steel production (in ‘000 metric tons):
First three quarters 2011 compared corresponding period of 2010
|
Region |
Full Year |
+/- % |
First Nine Months |
Y-o- Y | ||
|
2009 |
2010 |
2010 |
2011 | |||
|
Western Europe/Africa |
6,449 |
7,875 |
22.1 |
6,017 |
5,978 |
-0.7 |
|
Central and Eastern Europe |
237 |
340 |
43.6 |
252 |
303 |
20.4 |
|
The Americas |
1,942 |
2,609 |
34.4 |
2,041 |
1,929 |
-5.5 |
|
Asia (excluding China) |
7,472 |
9,011 |
20.6 |
6,718 |
6,593 |
-1.9 |
|
China |
8,805 |
11,256 |
27.8 |
8,313 |
9,376 |
12.8 |
|
World total |
24,904 |
31,090 |
24.8 |
23,341 |
24,179 |
3.6 |
Source: International Stainless Steel Forum (ISSF)
You can see from this table that if you take a look just at the third quarter then production was in fact the highest ever recorded for a third quarter. All of the increases came from the Asia Region inclusive of China. Production in the Central/Eastern Europe region actually decreased compared to their second quarter of 2011 but was higher than in the third quarter of 2010.
Western Europe/Africa and the Americas regions their production decreased when compared to both the second quarter of 2011 and the third quarter of 2010.
Table 2: Stainless crude steel production (in ‘000 metric tons):
Quarter-by-quarter comparison: 2011 and 2010
|
Region |
Quarter 1 |
+/- % Y-o-Y |
Quarter 2 |
+/- % Y-o-Y |
Quarter 3 |
+/- % Y-o-Y | |||
|
2010 |
2011 |
2010 |
2011 |
2010 |
2011 | ||||
|
Western Europe/Africa |
2,081 |
2,216 |
6.5 |
2,222 |
2,080 |
-6.4 |
1,715 |
1,683 |
-1.9 |
|
Central/Eastern Europe |
73 |
85 |
16.8 |
89 |
114 |
26.9 |
89 |
104 |
16.8 |
|
The Americas |
728 |
779 |
6.9 |
671 |
598 |
-10.9 |
641 |
553 |
-13.8 |
|
Asia (excluding China) |
2,235 |
2,238 |
0.2 |
2,278 |
2,134 |
-6.3 |
2,205 |
2,220 |
0.7 |
|
China |
2,607 |
3,076 |
18.0 |
2,862 |
3,129 |
9.3 |
2,844 |
3,170 |
11.5 |
|
World total |
7,724 |
8,395 |
8.7 |
8,122 |
8,054 |
-0.8 |
7,494 |
7,730 |
3.1 |
Source: International Stainless Steel Forum (ISSF)
Although some countries are seeing a decrease in their production levels overall an all time high in the third quarter is extremely positive for the future of the stainless steel industry.
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