World crude steel production for the 63 countries reporting to the World Steel Association (worldsteel) was 123Mt tonnes (Mt) in February 2013, an increase of 1.2% compared to February 2012.
China’s crude steel production for February 2013 was 61.8Mt, up by 9.8% compared to February 2012. Elsewhere in Asia, Japan produced 8.3Mt, down -3.4% compared to the same month last year. South Korea’s crude steel production was 5.0Mt in February 2013, a decrease of -8.5% over February 2012.
In the EU, Germany produced 3.4Mt, a decrease of -3.7% on February 2012. Italy’s crude steel production was 2.1Mt, down -15.0% compared to February 2012. France produced 1.3Mt, a decrease of -0.8% and Spain produced 1.2Mt, -1.7% lower than February 2012. On average, a –5.6% decline was seen in the EU27 countries and a –3.9% fall in other European countries. In the EU, only the Netherlands, (+7.4%), Slovakia (+0.4%) and UK showed growth in February 2013 compared with February 2012. UK showed a massive +57% increase producing 0.882Mt in February 2013, reflecting the start-up of the rebuilt No2 blast furnace at Port Talbot.
Turkey’s crude steel production for February 2013 was 2.7Mt, a decrease of -3.9% compared to February 2012.
The USA produced 6.7Mt of crude steel in February 2013, down -11.8% on February 2012.
In February 2013, Brazil produced 2.6Mt of crude steel, a decrease of -6.2% compared to the same month last year.
The crude steel capacity utilisation ratio for the 63 countries in February 2013 rose to 80.5% from 76.7% in January 2013, but compared to February 2012, it is 0.8% point lower.
A country by country listing of the statistics is available from
http://www.worldsteel.org/statistics/crude-steel-production.html