Brazilian production of crude steel totaled 2.787 million mt in March 2024, against 2.638 million mt in March 2023, according to the Brazilian steel institute IABr.
Under the same comparative basis, the production of rolled products increased by 3.6 percent to 1.934 million mt, with the production of flat products overall increasing by 7.5 percent to 1.102 million mt and the production of long products declining by 1.2 percent to 832,000 mt.
Similarly, domestic sales of steel products declined by 7.3 percent to 1.694 million mt and the apparent consumption of steel products declined by 1.6 percent to 2.108 million mt, while exports declined by 23.2 percent to 942,000 mt and imports increased by 46.0 percent to 486,000 mt.
Considering the first quarter of 2024, on a yearly basis, crude steel production increased by 6.2 percent to 8.293 million mt, domestic sales were stable at 4.863 million mt, exports declined by 17.9 percent to 2.567 million mt, imports increased by 25.4 percent to 1.298 million mt and the apparent consumption of steel products increased by 3.3 percent to 5.974 million mt.
According to IABr, in March, the imports from China were equivalent to 60 percent of the total of steel imported by Brazil.
The Brazilian steel industry claims that much of these imports from China are made at dumping prices, having asked the government for the adoption of a 25 percent import tax as a compensation for the lower prices.
