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Steel consumption growth below 10% in '05

BEIJING - China's steel consumption growth rate will be in single digits in 2005, China Association of Iron and Steel Industry President Wu Xichun predicts.

As for this year, the association forecasts China's steel consumption growth will be 13%.

China became the largest steel consumer in the world in 1994. Since then, it has kept breaking record in terms of steel consumption, and its apparent consumption of steel even topped 220 million tons in 2003, up 22.38% year on year. It is expected that China's steel consumption will be 260 million tons this year, up 13.2% year on year.

According to Wu, steel demand has close relation with fixed assets investment. Due to macro-economic control policies implemented since the second quarter of this year, growth of fixed assets investment in China has slowed as compared with in 2003 and is expected to go on decreasing in 2005. It is expected that China's steel consumption will be 280-290 million tons in 2005, up 6.4-10.3% over 2004.

(Asia Pulse/XIC)

Oct 30, 2004

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