The coronavirus emergency has impacted the Italian steel industry causing domestic crude steel production to decline by 40.2 percent year on year in March this year. According to the latest data released by Federacciai, the Italian steel producers' association, Italian steelmakers produced 1.367 million mt of crude steel in March, compared to 2.041 million mt in February and 2.285 million mt in March 2019.
In the first quarter, Italian crude steel output amounted to 5.278 million mt, i.e., down 16.2 percent compared to the same period last year.
As regards the flat and long product categories, Italian production in the first three months of the year amounted to 2,669 million mt and 2.63 million mt, down 13.3 percent and 18.6 percent year on year, respectively.
In the month of March alone - the month when the lockdown period decided by the Italian government began - flat steel production fell by 30.5 percent to 830,000 mt, while long steel production collapsed by 46.7 percent to 662,000 mt, both year on year.
