Steel consumption up 4.6% in August, exports rise 36%

India's steel consumption in August rose by 4.6 per cent to 7.416 million tonnes (mt) over the corresponding month last year and exports in the last month grew by 36 per cent, a steel ministry's report said on Thursday.

"Overall consumption at 7.416 mt in August 2017 was up by 7.4 per cent over July 2017 and was up by 4.6 per cent over August 2016," said the report of the ministry's Joint Plant Committee (JPC).

According to it, India's consumption of total finished steel saw a growth of 4.4 per cent in the April-August period of the current fiscal to 35.329 mt over the same period last year, under the influence of rising production.

Exports of total finished steel increased by 57.1 per cent to 3.73 mt in the April-August period over the same period last year and overall exports at 0.923 mt in August were up 20 per cent over the previous month but grew by 36 per cent over the year-ago month.

However, import of total finished steel at 3.458 mt in the first five months of the current fiscal grew by 15.9 per cent over same period last year.

"Overall imports in August 2017 at 0.955 mt was up by 20 per cent over July 2017 and was up by 62 per cent over August 2016," the report said.

India was a net importer of total finished steel in the last month and maintained its net exporter status in the first five months of the current fiscal.

According to the provisional data released by JPC, production for sale of total finished steel in August was at 8.776 mt, up 2.3 per cent over the year-ago month.

"Production for sale of total finished steel at 43.205 mt registered a growth of 5.9 per cent during April-August 2017 over same period of last year," the report said.

During April-August, the ISP (Integrated Steel Plant) producers produced 25.23 mt, which was a growth of 12 per cent while production for the other producers during the period was up by 0.3 per cent.

--IANS

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