Global steel production stable in December 2014, Worldsteel says

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Crude steel production in the 65 Worldsteel member countries totalled 133.7 million tonnes during the month.

China’s crude steel output rose by 1.5% year-on-year in December to 68.1 million tonnes.

Total crude steel output in Asia for the month grew by 1.2% year-on-year to 92.1 million tonnes. However, apart from China, only India expanded production in the region – by 2.2% year-on-year.

In the European Union, steel output declined by 5.7% year-on-year in December 2014 to 12.5 million tonnes.

All the biggest steel producing countries in the EU showed year-on-year decreases in steel output last month: 6.8% in France, 5.8% in Germany, 16.9% in Italy, 3.8% in Spain and 34.1% in the UK.

Outside the EU, Turkey produced 2.7 million tonnes of crude steel in December, down by 6.3% year-on-year.

Output in Russia increased by 2.6% year-on-year during the month, reaching 5.9 million tonnes. Production in Ukraine, meanwhile, showed a significant drop of 28.5% year-on-year in December to 1.9 million tonnes.

In the Americas, steel production over the month rose in the USA by 3.7% year-on-year to 7.4 million tonnes, while output in Brazil dipped by 1% year-on-year to 2.6 million tonnes.

Worldsteel’s estimated global capacity utilisation rate was 72.7%, 2.4% lower than in the corresponding period last year.

Global steel output in 2014
In the full year of 2014, world steel production grew by 1.2% year-on-year to 1.66 billion tonnes.

China achieved a 0.9% year-on-year rise in output to 882.7 million tonnes. Production in Asia as a whole grew by 1.4% year-on-year to 1.1 billion tonnes.

Output in the EU reached 169.2 million tonnes in 2014, up by 1.8% year-on-year.

In the CIS, production declined by 2.8% year-on-year to 105.1 million tonnes.

Output in Northern America increased by 2% year-on-year to 121.2 million tonnes, while in South America production dropped by 1.4% year-on-year to 45.2 million tonnes.