Latin America’s steel producers association Alacero tells Kallanish that Chinese finished steel imports to the region continued to fall during January to May 2016. This happened as steel imports from China to the world increased over the same period.

China shipped 2.7 million tonnes of finished steel and steel-derivative products to Latin America in the first five months of 2016. This was -35% less than the 4.2mt registered during the same period in 2015, Alacero reports. The equivalent global figure was 42.5mt or a 7% increase on the year before.  The region received 6% of total Chinese exports to the world on this basis.

In terms of imports of steel derivative products, 316,000t of steel derivatives from China landed in the region over the January to May period. This was down by -24.2% year-on-year. Latin America remains however the main global destination for Chinese steel-derivative products and made up 11.1% of the total global figure in Jan-May 2016. The region is followed by the Philippines (170,000t, 6% of total) and the US with 168,000t (5.9% of the total).

Central America took the lion’s share of imports of Chinese steel over January to May receiving 604,000t or 22% of regional input. Chile with 458,000t saw 17% of the total and Peru at 380,000t, had a 14% regional share.

Flat products represented 47% of the finished steel and steel-derived products imported from China in the first five months, reaching 1.3mt.  Amongst these hot dipped galvanised coil amounted to 357,000t or a 28% share of Chinese flat steel inflow, the steelmaker’s association says. Other alloyed steel sheets and coils with 302,000t, or a 24% share, and Zn and Al-coated coil (173,000t, 14% share) were the other main flat imports.

China exported 1mt of long steel to Latin America in the first five months of 2016, Alacero confirms. These products were mainly bars (558,000t, 56% share of long steel) and wire rod (339,000t, 34% share). The region received 142,000t of seamless pipes (5% of the total) during the period.