An increase of 47%! China is Turkey’s largest stainless steel supplier
In the first five months of this year, Turkey imported 288,500 tons of stainless steel, higher than the 248,000 tons imported in the same period of the previous year. The cost of these imported products totaled 566 million US dollars, which is 24% higher than the global steel price.
The latest Turkish Statistical Institute (TUIK) data shows that East Asian suppliers continued to increase their share of the Turkish stainless steel market at competitive prices during this period.
From January to May this year, China became Turkey’s largest stainless steel supplier by shipping 96,000 tons of stainless steel to Turkey, a year-on-year increase of 47%. If this growth trend continues, China’s stainless steel exports to Turkey will exceed 200,000 tons by 2021.
As of May, Turkey’s imports of stainless steel plates from South Korea were still relatively strong, at 70,000 tons.
The latest data show that Turkey imported 21,700 tons of stainless steel coils from Spain in five months, while the total amount of stainless steel wire rod imported from Italy was 16,500 tons.
Posco Assan TST, Turkey’s only cold-rolled stainless steel mill, headquartered in Kokaeli Izmit near Istanbul, has an annual production capacity of 300,000 tons/year, stainless steel cold-rolled coils with a thickness of 0.3 to 3.0 mm and a width of up to 1600 mm.