World steel production up 5.8% for June 2018 YoY

World crude steel production was 881.5 Mt in the first six months of 2018, up by 4.6% compared to the same period in 2017. Asia produced 613.9 Mt of crude steel, an increase of 5.2% over the first half of 2017. The EU produced 87.3 Mt of crude steel in the first half of 2018, up by 1.6% compared to the same period of 2017. North America’s crude steel production in the first six months of 2018 was 59.0 Mt, an increase of 2.4% compared to the first half of 2017. The C.I.S. produced 50.5 Mt of crude steel in the first six months of 2018, an increase of 2.8% over the same months of 2017.

China’s crude steel production for June 2018 was 80.2 Mt, an increase of 7.5% compared to June 2017. Japan produced 8.8 Mt of crude steel in June 2018, up 4.2% on June 2017. India produced 8.7 Mt of crude steel in June 2018, an increase of 7.4% compared to June 2017. South Korea’s crude steel production was 6.1 Mt in June 2018, an increase of 3.2% on June 2017.

In the EU, Italy produced 2.1 Mt of crude steel, up by 1.5% on June 2017. France produced 1.3 Mt of crude steel, a decrease of 4.4% compared to June 2017.

Turkey’s crude steel production for June 2018 was 3.0 Mt, up by 0.7% on June 2017.

Crude steel production in Ukraine was 1.7 Mt this month, up 7.5% on June 2017.

The US produced 6.8 Mt of crude steel in June 2018, an increase of 0.8% compared to June 2017.

The crude steel capacity utilisation ratio of the 64 countries in June 2018 was 78.5%. This is 3.8 percentage points higher than June 2017. Compared to May 2018, it is 1.0 percentage point higher.

Source: Worldsteel