Steel Exports Rise to 3.4 Million Tonnes in 6 Months

Date: 16 October 2019 - 22:15

News ID: ۷۱۷۹۲

TEHRAN (Dispatches) -- Iran’s exports of various steel products rose between March and September to top 3.4 million tonnes, official IRNA news agency reported Wednesday.
Eleven major steel mills across Iran exported a total of 3,488,867 tonnes of ingots and other steel products in the six-month period, it said.
The biggest increase was recorded at Bonab Steel in northwest Iran, as the mill exported a total of 21,190 tonnes of iron rods during the period, an increase of 1,219 percent compared to last year.
Khouzestan Steel (KSC), one of the largest and oldest steel mills in Iran in the country’s northwest, came last with a 16 percent decrease in exports that totaled 1,001,378 tonnes.
Nevertheless, the KSC was the top exporter in the period, accounting 28.7 percent of the total exports, followed by Mobarakeh Steel at 21.5 and Esfahan Steel at 16.2.
The report said Iran Alloy Steel in the Yazd province marked the largest increase in exports among the mills in the month between August and September during which it exported nearly 10,000 tonnes of iron rods, an increase of 168 percent compared to the similar period last year.
However, Khorasan Steel in northeast of Iran reported the lowest amount of exports in the same month with only 129 tonnes, a 99-percent decline compared to the last year.
Iran has maintained its place among the 10 leading producers of steel products in the world despite U.S. sanctions that have specifically targeted the country’s metal sector.
Official data suggest Iran’s annual steel output hit a record 35 million tonnes in the year ending March 2019, during which exports stood at around seven million tonnes.
Sources within the industry say Iran seeks to become the seventh top steel producer in the world by 2025 with a production plateau of 55 million tonnes a year.