In December last year, domestic steel product consumption in Japan amounted to 4.42 million metric tons, up by 6.4 percent compared to November and rising by 6.2 percent year on year, according to the data released by the Japan Iron and Steel Association (JISF). Meanwhile, in 2020, domestic steel product consumption in Japan decreased by 13.6 percent year on year to 45.31 million metric tons.
In 2020, steel product consumption in the construction sector in Japan fell by 4.5 percent to 9.97 million metric tons, while steel product consumption in the Japanese automotive sector amounted to 10.53 million metric tons, down 17.6 percent, both on year-on-year basis. In the given year, Japan’s shipbuilding industry consumed 3.08 million metric tons of steel products, declining by 20.4 percent compared to 2019.