World's crude steel production stood at 133.7 million tonne in July, up 1.4% from corresponding period last year with India making a significant contribution in%age terms despite a not-so-strong demand scenario in the domestic market.

As per the World Steel Association (WSA) release, China's crude steel production was at 66.8 million tonne, up 2.6% from same period last year.

Elsewhere in Asia, Japan produced 8.9 million tonne crude steel, an increase of 0.5%, while India produced 8.1 million tonne of crude steel in July 2016, up 8.1% compared to the same month last year. South Korea's crude steel production was 6 million tonne, up 1.5%.

The WSA report showed production for 66 countries across globe where capacity utilisation ratios of the 66 countries were at 68.3%, same as the July 2015 levels. On sequential basis, however, utilisations dropped 3.7%age points.

In the European Union, Germany's crude steel production stood at 3.4 million tonne, down 6.1%, while United Kingdom produced meagre 0.7 million tonne, down 27.3%.

Turkey's crude steel production for July 2016 was 2.7 million tonne, up 6.5% from same period last year. Russia produced 6.1 million tonne crude steel, up 0.9% over last year. Ukraine produced 2.1 million tonne crude steel, up 10.5% compared to the same month in 2015. United States produced 6.9 million tonne, a decrease of 2.2% compared to July 2015, while Brazil's crude steel production stood at 2.7 million tonne, down 6.0% on year-on-year basis.

Despite weak seasonality, this is a strong performance. "We attribute this production rise to recent commissioning of capacities by most of the bigger integrated producers such as Steel Authority, JSW Steel and Tata Steel," said Emkay Global in its report. Essar Steel has also been improving its utilization, it said.

Since last few months several measures have been put in place by several countries to protect their steel industries with India being no exception. India has notified anti- dumping duty on hot-rolled and cold-rolled products recently replacing minimum import price (MIP) to address the concerns of the primary steel producers. However, despite these measures, poor demand has been weighing on the prices for last few months.

"We believe, sustainable demand growth is eminent for price recovery and so a good monsoon and 7th pay commission may help in this regard," said the brokerage.

sources :business-standard.com