According to the provisional foreign trade statistics compiled by the Turkish Statistical Institute (TUIK) and the Turkish Undersecretariat of Customs, in January this year Turkey's iron and steel exports totaled $416.4 million in value, decreasing by 29.9 percent year on year and down 27 percent over December 2009, while exports of articles of iron or steel declined by 2.9 percent compared to January 2009 and were down 27 percent month on month, amounting to a value of $320.17 million.
Thus, in the month in question, the domestic iron and steel industry ranked fifth among Turkey's top exporting sectors, while exports of articles of iron and steel ranked eighth.
Meanwhile, in January Turkey's iron and steel imports totaled $1.11 billion, increasing by 35.1 percent year on year but down 7.27 percent over December, while imports of articles of iron or steel declined by 2.2 percent compared to January 2009 and were down 37 percent month on month, reaching $106.18 million.
In January, iron and steel imports ranked third among Turkey's top importing sectors, while the imports of articles of iron and steel ranked 19th.