Italy reduced steel production by 5% y/y in 2024

Italian steelmakers reduced steel production by 5% in 2024 compared to 2023, to 20 million tons. This is reported by SteelOrbis with reference to data from the Italian Federation of Steelworkers Federacciai.

Production of long products for the year amounted to 11.7 million tons, down 0.2% compared to 2023, and flat products – 8.6 million tons (-9.7% y/y). Thus, long products output experienced only a slight decline, supported by increased construction activity. At the same time, the weakness of the automotive sector and industry, as well as high volumes of competitive imports (5.58 million tons in January-October 2024), had a negative impact on flat steel production.

In December 2024, Italian steelmakers reduced steel production by 8.8% compared to December 2023 and by 33.4% compared to the previous month to 1.199 million tons. Long products output amounted to 682 thousand tons, down 4.7% y/y and 38% m/m, and flat products output amounted to 639 thousand tons (+3.2% y/y, -14.4% m/m). The slowdown in long products production reflects the seasonal weakness in demand from the construction industry, which is a key consumer of such products.

As GMK Center reported earlier, in 2023, Italian steelmakers reduced steel production by 2.5% compared to 2022, to 21.06 million tons. The decline in steel production was driven by a decline in global demand for steel products and high energy costs.

Long products production for the year amounted to 11.68 million tons, down 2.9% compared to 2022, and flat products production amounted to 9.54 million tons (-0.1% y/y).

In total, the EU produced 126.3 million tons of steel in 2023, down 7.4% y/y. In December, the EU countries increased steel production by 2.7% compared to December 2022 – up to 9.1 million tons.