Late on Friday, September 18, ArcelorMittal Italia announced it will halt or reduce activities at several facilities at its Taranto-based plant starting from today, September 21. More specifically, the cold rolling area, the galvanizing line No. 1 and the pickling line will be idled indefinitely, while other plants will have their weekly shifts reduced. Local metal unions commented, "All of this is caused by a drop in orders that will result in cascading staff reductions across all operating and maintenance facilities."
"The new stops and reductions in plant activity communicated by ArcelorMittal are yet another provocative act towards workers and trade unions. In recent days, the company has accelerated actions that have no economic and organizational justifications," the unions stated.
"ArcelorMittal must be sent away for nor not fulfilling the contract and both economic and environmental terms, and because it continues to destroy a territory and the plants, putting at risk the health and safety of workers and citizens," the local union UILM said.
The Italian government and ArcelorMittal are still holding negotiations aimed at forming a new industrial plan for Europe's largest single steel site and the only integrated steelmaker in Italy. In early June, the company presented a plan that provided for approximately 5,000 redundancies in total and production of 3 million mt of steel in 2020, to be increased to 6 million mt per year in 2022-23 and to 8 million mt in 2026. In addition, it entailed the postponement of environmental investments and a request for funding and state resources. This plan was rejected by both the local unions and the government. Talks between the government and ArcelorMittal are expected to accelerate in the coming days as they were put on hold by both local elections and a referendum in the country yesterday and today on whether to reduce the number of members of the country's parliament.