South African imports of carbon and alloy steel products (excluding semis, stainless steel and drawn wire) increased 15.7% year-on-year and 71.1% on-month in October to 140,916 tonnes, Kallanish learns from the South African Iron and Steel Institute.

Hot rolled coil/plate in coil was the largest imported product at 71,525t, followed by hot-dip galvanized coil (16,031t) and colour coated coil (9,646t). The average prices for imported product in October were ZAR 6,516/t ($567.4) for HRC, ZAR 10,074/t ($877) for HDG and ZAR 12,102/t ($1,054) for colour coated coil.

Ten-month finished steel imports thus totalled 856,251t, a decline of 26.1% on the corresponding period of 2013. Aluminium or zinc coated flat products and hot rolled sections experienced the biggest decreases. The main imported product was HRC/plate in coil (331,608t), followed by HDG (126,256t) and colour coated coil (56,623t). Semi-finished product imports, however, increased 68% to 137,770t.

The International Trade Administration Commission of South Africa is studying a request from the Southern African Coil Coaters Association to impose import tariffs of up to 10% on galvanized and colour coated coils (see Kallanish 13 November). South African crude steel output was down 2.2% y-o-y in October to 620,000t.

South Africa registered apparent finished steel consumption of 5.4 million t in 2013. Its main steel-consuming sectors are construction (40%), automotive (11%), machinery and equipment (9%), packaging and mining (both 7%). The World Steel Association forecasts a 7.7% consumption increase in 2015 to 7.7mt.