Consumption of steel products in Ukraine increased to 557 thousand tons in January-February

Imports account for more than 37.3% or 207.4 thousand tons

In January-February 2025, Ukraine increased its consumption of steel products (rolled products and semi-finished products) by 50.5% compared to the same period in 2024, up to 556.7 thousand tons. This is evidenced by the data of Ukrmetprom.

Over 2 months, Ukraine imported 207.4 thousand tons of steel products, up 21.1% y/y. Imports accounted for 37.3% of the domestic rolled steel consumption market. The share of imports in domestic consumption of steel products decreased by 9.01 percentage points y/y.

The structure of imports is characterized by a significant dominance of flat products over long products – 82.55% and 14.42%, respectively. In January-February 2024, the dominance of flat products over long products was also significant – 85.05% and 13.67%, respectively.

In 2 months, Ukrainian steelmakers produced 957 thousand tons of rolled products, up 6.3% year-on-year. The company exported 607.7 thousand tons of steel products, down 13.4% y/y.

The domestic market received 349.3 thousand tons of rolled and semi-finished products, up 75.7% y/y. In January-February, Ukrainian steelmakers significantly increased shipments to the domestic market, with exports accounting for 63.5% of total output over the period, up from 77.9% a year ago.

The share of flat products in export deliveries increased to 47.8%, up from 38.7% a year earlier. The share of long products in exports increased to 19% from 13.9%. At the same time, the share of semi-finished products fell to 33.2% from 47.5%.

The main export markets for Ukrainian rolled steel in January-February 2025 are the European Union (73.8%), the rest of Europe (13.5%) and the CIS (7.7%). Among steel importers, the first place is occupied by other European countries (56.6%), followed by the EU (24.5%), and the third place by Asian countries (18.5%).

As GMK Center reported earlier, consumption of steel products in Ukraine in 2024 decreased by 6.26% year-on-year to 3.288 million tons. Over the year, 1.235 million tons of steel products were imported, up 10.2% y/y, and about 4.17 million tons were exported, up 39.7% y/y. Domestic production amounted to 6.22 million tons (+15.8% y/y).