Consumption of steel products in Ukraine decreased to 3.29 million tons in January-December

In 2024, Ukraine reduced consumption of steel products (rolled and semi-finished products) by 6.26% year-on-year – to 3.288 million tons. This is according to Ukrmetalurgprom.

In the period under review, Ukraine imported 1.235 million tons of steel products, up 10.2% compared to January-December 2023. Imports account for 37.57% of the domestic rolled steel consumption market in the country. The share of imports in domestic consumption of steel products increased by 5.61 percentage points y/y.

The structure of imports in 2024 is characterized by a significant dominance of flat products over long products (79.61% and 18.83%, respectively). The dominance of flat products over long products was also significant in 2023 – 81.02% and 18.06%, respectively.

In total, Ukrainian steelmakers produced 6.22 million tons of rolled products in 2024, up 15.8% year-on-year. About 4.17 million tons of products were exported, up 39.6% y/y.

In January-December last year, the domestic market received 2.05 million tons of rolled and semi-finished products, down 14% year-on-year. The share of exports in total production in 2024 was 67%, while last year it was 55.4%.

The share of flat products in export deliveries in 2024 remained almost at the level of January-December 2023 (40.27% and 39.22%, respectively). The share of long products decreased significantly to 14.73% compared to 17.7% a year earlier.

Last year, the main export markets for Ukrainian rolled steel products were the European Union (70.7%), Africa (10.1%) and the rest of Europe (8.3%).
Among steel importers, the first place is occupied by other European countries (51.8%), the second – by the EU (27.7%), and the third – by Asian countries (19.2%).

As GMK Center reported earlier, in 2024, Ukrainian steelmakers increased steel production by 21.6% compared to 2023, from 6.23 million tons to 7.58 million tons. At the same time, the figure is significantly lower than pre-war levels, in particular, in 2021, steel production exceeded 21.37 million tons (production includes Azovstal and Ilyich Iron and Steel Works of Mariupol).