EU market is more important for Ukrainian metal sector than Russian market, says expert
Kyiv, December 20 (Interfax-Ukraine) – The EU countries' share of exports of Ukrainian metal products is 28%, while the share of the CIS states is 16%, including 70% of the exports going to the Russian market, the director of Ukrpromzovnishekspertyza, Volodymyr Vlasiuk, said at a press conference at Interfax-Ukraine on Wednesday.
"The EU sales market is more important for us that the Russian market," he said adding that there is a need to diversify the sales market via other countries.
He said that it is expected that in 2012, Ukraine will export 22.6 million tonnes of rolled steel, while in the pre-crisis period rolled steel exports stood at 28.4 million tonnes. Supplies to the EU market this year will reach 4.7 million tonnes of rolled steel compared to 6.6 million tonnes in 2011 and deliveries to the Asian markets will come to 2.3 million tonnes compared to 3.2 million tonnes in 2011.
Vlasiuk said that in January-October 2012, 22.5% of metal products made by Ukrainian companies was sold on the domestic market compared to 21.8% year-over-year and 77.5% was sold on foreign markets compared to 78.2% year-over-year.
He added that the domestic market failed to compensate the reduction in export sales. This year exports will reach 8.3 million tonnes of rolled metal (8.4 million tonnes in 2011).
Vlasiuk said that in the world a rise in steel consumption slowed to 2.2% in 2012 compared to 7.7% in 2011.
"Steel consumption grows in the world, although the pace of growth is falling," he said, adding that the negative factor is the extra amount of steel production facilities in the world with the total capacity of around 470 million tonnes.
As for Ukrainian facilities, Vlasiuk said that in 2012 their loading amounted to 69%, while in 2011 it was 75.3%. The loading of facilities in China, Russia and Turkey this year was higher than in Ukraine, and it was 76.5% on average in the world.
The director of Ukrpromzovnishekspertyza pointed at a fall in demand on metal products in China. He said that this is evidence that the new period of the steel market development has started.
"The period of the reasonably developed steel market with all of the accompanied factors – when the production cost and sales infrastructure are of large importance, and there are not super incomes - took the place of the period of the high development pace when China was a driver that pushed up prices and dictated demand," Vlasiuk said.