Pasini: Recovery of Italian steel industry has been helped by exports

Monday, 30 January 2012 09:27:39 (GMT+2)

Giuseppe Pasini, chairman of Italian steelmakers association Federacciai, has stated that Italy's iron and steel industry reacted to the global crisis of 2009, when sales revenues fell by 50-60 percent, with the help of its export activity, as reported in an interview with Italian financial newspaper Il Sole 24 Ore. However, he admitted that forecasts for the industry are uncertain once again.

According to Mr. Pasini, in Italy the current economic slowdown is aggravated by critical issues such as excess bureaucracy restricting development of ambitious infrastructural projects, the high costs of energy and even EU environmental protection policies, which are forward-looking but penalize European industry. He went on to comment, "Italian steel enterprises are far too small to target China or India; however, closer countries also offer great opportunities."

He noted, for example, that Algeria and Tunisia have been a good source of deals for Italian steelmaker Feralpi Group, his own family business. Indeed, helped by exports, in 2011 the company's sales revenue went up by 28 percent year on year to €1.1 billion. Regarding the state of the steel sector in Italy, Pasini stated, "The Italian steel market is affected by overcapacity of about 30 percent.

The only way to overcome this is through mergers and acquisitions, in order to challenge the international steel giants."

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