Despite the challenging scenario Brazilian steel producers are likely to face in the years to come, especially in the short term, as the nation’s segment tries to recover from a crisis, some opportunities appear as urbanization grows, a worldsteel executive said.
Talking to participants of the Brazil Steel Congress in Sao Paulo, Edwin Basson, director-general at the steel association, said there’s a “positive” relationship between urbanization and steel use per capita, but that such an opportunity “appears to be weaker in Brazil than elsewhere in the world.”
“Brazil hasn’t developed well in this aspect compared to other countries,” he said, forecasting global steel demand could increase by 40 percent by 2040, from 1.5 billion to 2.1 billion mt.
“Every time urbanization grows, the impacts of it are direct in the steel segment. For sure we’ll have more steel consumption, but question is: which companies will provide it? Will these companies have [positive] results?” asked André Gerdau Johannpeter, CEO at Gerdau.
During a panel at Brazil’s Steel Congress, Basson was asked its position about the “unfair competition” with Chinese steel.
Basson said that worldsteel can’t be involved in the trade of steel, so it cannot “negotiate capacity reductions.”
“At worldsteel we’ll try to keep the communication lines with China open,” Basson said.