In October this year, Japan's iron and steel product exports amounted to 3.36 million metric tons, falling by 0.7 percent month on month and down by 1.9 percent year on year, while Japan's iron and steel product imports totaled 706,227 metric tons, with a month-on-month increase of 2.5 percent and a year-on-year rise of one percent, according to the customs statistics released by the Japanese Ministry of Finance (JISF).
In the first ten months of this year, Japanese iron and steel product exports amounted to 34.56 million mt, declining by 0.8 percent, while Japanese iron and steel product imports came to 6.66 million mt, remaining almost stable, both compared to the same period of 2015.
Regarding Japan's major iron and steel product export markets, in the January-October period of this year the country's iron and steel exports to South Korea totaled 5.92 million mt, up 6.5 percent, while exports to China increased by 1.4 percent to 4.59 million mt, the export volume to Taiwan amounted to 2.12 million metric tons, down 15.1 percent, exports to Thailand totaled 4.82 million metric tons, rising by 9.3 percent, while exports to the US totaled 1.72 million metric tons, falling by 14.2 percent, all year on year.
In the first ten months of the current year, Japan imported 3.02 million metric tons of iron and steel products from South Korea, up 2.8 percent, it imported 1.39 million metric tons from China, decreasing by 5.8 percent, while imports from Taiwan fell 2.9 percent to 894,636 metric tons, all compared to the same period of 2015.
| Exports | Imports | |||||||
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| October 2016 (mt) | Change m-o-m (%) | January-October 2016 | Change y-o-y (%) | October 2016 (mt) | Change m-o-m (%) | January-October 2016 | Change y-o-y (%) |
| Semi-finished | 288,374 | -11 | 3,782,838 | -3.7 | 11,492 | -31.1 | 155,457 | 30.7 |
| Bars | 41,339 | -35.4 | 576,518 | 11.2 | 1,739 | -40.6 | 29,473 | -5.6 |
| 60,315 | 5.4 | 665,158 | 6.1 | 6,523 | 28.9 | 66,558 | -29.5 | |
| Heavy plate | 213,465 | 7.5 | 2,443,875 | -5.5 | 68,802 | 27.2 | 468,511 | -4.9 |
| 1,052,236 | 0.3 | 10,922,154 | 1.0 | 131,144 | -10.5 | 1,383,159 | 1.2 | |
| 244,318 | 10.4 | 2,252,322 | -3.1 | 76,641 | 6.6 | 681,499 | -4.4 | |
| Galvanized sheet | 247,376 | -2.4 | 2,460,142 | -8.5 | 63,716 | 16.7 | 583,071 | -1.8 |
| Special steel | 755,864 | 1.2 | 7,003,824 | 7.7 | 102,389 | 15.2 | 902,963 | 14 |
| Stainless steel | 90,269 | -2.5 | 846,054 | -6 | 22,164 | 49 | 170,060 | 18.5 |