ArcelorMittal Italia, Italian subsidiary of global steel giant ArcelorMittal, will halt its steel mill 1 in Taranto from Thursday, January 23, until the end of March, as announced on Monday by the company to local metalworkers' unions. 250 out of 457 employees will be laid off, while the rest will be relocated to steel mill 2. Part of the production of steel mill 1 will be moved to steel mill 2. According to unions, the new production structure is due to "a poor supply of raw materials and the current production capacity linked to the orders situation".
The unions have expressed their opposition to the company's decision as they believe that the temporary transfer of production to steel mill 2 may have negative repercussions in terms of safety and the environment. They also believe that "ArcelorMittal's choice is unacceptable because, to date, no industrial plan has been shared with the government and the trade union organizations." Accordingly, they have asked for "the immediate suspension of the multinational's unilateral initiative".
In mid-January, ArcelorMittal Italia had announced that its plate production would resume from January 10 for four weeks, to produce 30,000 mt of products for sale in both the domestic market and the export market. However, Uilm union general secretary Rocco Palombella judged this move to be insufficient, stating, "In this complicated and dramatic scenario, the government and ArcelorMittal continue to waste precious time. The deadline of the end of January is now imminent. ArcelorMittal continues to announce layoffs and to slow down investments in environmentalization. With less than 4 million mt produced per year, significant market shares continue to be lost."