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South Africa’s crude steel production fell 1.5% year-on-year to 610 000 t in July, compared with the 619 000 t produced in July 2013.
However, according to the latest World Steel Association (worldsteel) statistics, Africa’s crude steel output rose 21.2% year-on-year to 1.5-million tons in July, compared with 1.24-million tons in the prior comparable period.
Libya recorded an 85.9% year-on-year rise in output to 80 000 t, while output in Algeria grew 72.3% year-on year to 35 000 t in July. Egypt produced 744 000 t of crude steel in July – a 44.3% increase on the 516 000 t produced in July 2013.
Crude steel production in Morocco, however, fell by 18.6% to 35 000 t, compared with 43 000 t in the prior comparative period.
Meanwhile, global crude steel output increased 1.7% year-on-year to 137-million tons in July.
China raised its production by 1.5% year-on-year to 68.3-million tons, while output in South Korea increase 6.2% year-on-year. Crude steel output in Japan remained flat at 9.3-million tons in July.
In the European Union, Germany produced 3.4-million tons of crude steel in July, an increase of 1.5% year-on-year.
Production was down 4.4% year-on-year in the UK, 5.2% lower year-on-year in Austria and 0.5% lower year-on-year in the Netherlands.
Russia, meanwhile, lifted its output 8.1% year-on-year, while the US’s crude steel production increased 2.3% year-on-year in July.
Worldsteel noted that the crude steel capacity utilisation ratio was 75.4% in July, 1.2 percentage points lower than in July 2013.