According to preliminary figures released by the International Stainless Steel Forum (ISSF), global stainless steel crude steel production surged in the first nine months of 2010, rising by 29 percent year on year to reach 23 million metric tons. The year-on-year increase rate was 44.3 percent in the first half of 2010. All major regions showed significantly higher production volumes in the first three quarters of 2010.
In Asia with China excluded, stainless steel production increased by 28 percent to 6.4 million tons. Growth rates in Asia varied between seven and 40 percent roughly. China increased its stainless steel production in the period of review by 26.5 percent to 8.3 million metric tons.
Western Europe/Africa reported a 29.6 percent increase in stainless steel production during the first nine months of 2010. Total production was 6 million metric tons in this period.
In the Americas region, stainless crude steel production grew by 38.2 percent to 2 million metric tons in the first three quarters of the year. Production in the Eastern Europe region showed an increase of 44.2 percent, with just 250,000 metric tons.
Region | Nine months | Year-on-year change (%) | Third quarter 2010 | Year-on-year change (%) | ||
2009 | 2010 | 2009 | 2010 | |||
4,641 | 6,013 | 29.6 | 1,753 | 1,709 | -2.5 | |
Central/Eastern Europe | 175 | 252 | 44.2 | 75 | 89 | 19.2 |
The Americas | 1,476 | 2,041 | 38.2 | 643 | 641 | -0.3 |
Asia (without China) | 5,000 | 6,418 | 28.3 | 2,042 | 2,105 | 3.1 |
China | 6,569 | 8,313 | 26.5 | 2,502 | 2,844 | 13.7 |
Total World | 17,862 | 23,037 | 29.0 | 7,015 | 7,389 | 5.3 |
(x 1,000 metric tons)
Comparing the third quarter of 2010 with the same quarter of 2009 also shows a strong recovery of stainless steel melting activities. All regions showed strongly increased melting volumes. However, the comparison of the third quarters of 2010 and 2009 shows a growth rate of only 5.3 percent, which is much lower than the comparison of the growth rates in the previous quarters. Second quarter and first quarter data were up 33.4 percent and 57.8 percent respectively over the same period of 2009. This is mainly due to the base effect after the strong increased production in the second half of 2009 emerging from the deepest production losses ever recorded.