BIR: Volatility can offer more opportunities

Thursday, 17 October 2019 17:16:51 (GMT+3)   |   Istanbul
       

At the latest World Recycling Convention of Bureau of International Recycling (BIR), held in Budapest, session moderator Michael Lion of Everwell Resources Ltd pointed to the destabilizing impact of China’s new scrap import controls, the continuing uncertainty surrounding Brexit, worrying developments in Turkey and damaging trade disputes. And yet the resulting volatility can offer the trader “more opportunities than in a level-playing-field market”, he insisted.

In the first six months of 2019, there was a 20.7 percent increase in world’s largest scrap user China’s steel scrap usage to 103.28 million mt, mainly due to higher pollutant emission standards for the steel industry. According to BIR figures, most of China’s BOF mills have actively increased scrap inputs and their steel scrap/crude steel ratio is currently 20.2 percent. In the given period, scrap usage in the US increased by 5.1 percent to 24.9 million mt, while it declined by 1.3 percent in the EU to 46.78 million mt. BIR quoted Turkish Steel Producers Association for the reason of 12.2 percent decrease in Turkey’s scrap usage in the first six months and said it was because of the 12.8 percent fall in electric arc furnace production in the country. Turkey consumed 13.96 million mt of scrap in the given period, remaining as world’s leading scrap importer.

According to BIR President Tom Bird, the recycling industry is going to be “even more needed” in the future but is currently facing “many world issues over which we have no control, and that’s always a concern”. He called on the industry to respond by being “nimble and proactive”.


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