According to provisional customs data, South Korea imported 6.12 million mt of ferrous scrap in 2018, up 3.7 percent from 5.90 million mt in 2017.
During 2018, South Korea imported 3.93 million mt (64 percent) from Japan, 0.92 million mt (15 percent) from Russia, 0.86 million mt (14 percent) from the US, 0.10 million mt (2 percent) from the UK, and 0.31 million mt (5 percent) from other destinations including New Zealand and Australia.
Hyundai Steel’s mills remain the largest importers and recently stated the goal to import approximately 3.5 million mt of scrap in 2019. Hyundai Steel and several other mills shifted some buys from Japanese H2 scrap to higher quality ex-US and ex-UK scrap.
Korean scrap imports from Japan marginally increased from 3.90 million mt in 2017 to 3.93 million mt in 2018. Imports from the US increased from 0.50 million mt in 2017 to 0.86 million mt in 2018, up 72 percent year-on-year. Scrap imports from the UK increased to 0.10 million mt in 2018, up 150 percent from 0.04 million mt the previous year. South Korea reduced its scrap imports from Russia by 10 percent from 1.02 million mt in 2017 to 0.92 million mt this year. Unlike in 2017, South Korea did not purchase any significant ex-China scrap in 2018 while it imported 0.10 million mt the prior year.