India beats Japan to become the second largest steel producer in the world

Along with Japan, several other countries in the region, including South Korea, Pakistan and Taiwan, reported production cuts during the month.

The monthly steel production statistics released by the World Steel Association (worldsteel) show that India overtook Japan as the second largest steel producing country in February 2018. Regional production growth was 4.3% and exceeded the previous year's global growth rate of 3.5%.

In February, Asia's steel production totaled 90.475 million tonnes, up 4.3% from the same month a year earlier. In February last year, regional steel production amounted to 86.736 million tonnes. Vietnam reported the highest jump in manufacturing in a month. The country's production increased in February by 8.6% from 759,000 tons in February 2017 to 825,000 tons in February this year. In addition, China, the world's largest steel producer, produced 5.9% more steel than the previous year. The volume of production in the country amounted to 64.930 million tons, which is about 72% of the total regional production.

Indian steel products rose 3.4% from 8.155 to 8.434 million tonnes. The country became the second largest steel producer in the world after China, pushing Japan to third place. Japanese production totaled 8.296 million tonnes, a slight decrease of 0.5% over the same period last year. Thailand's production also increased slightly by almost 1.5% from 370,000 tons in February to 17 to 375,000 tons in February this year.

Along with Japan, several other countries in the region, including South Korea, Pakistan and Taiwan, reported production cuts during the month. Steel production in Pakistan decreased by 4.4% and amounted to 390 thousand tons. Taiwan production totaled 1.810 million tonnes, down 2.0% from the previous year. The South Korean market for rolled metal products showed a decline of 2.1%. In February 2018, production in the country amounted to 5.415 million tons against 5.529 million tons in February last year.

World crude steel production in February increased by 3.5% to 131.791 million tonnes, while the share of the Asian region in total world production amounted to almost 69%.