Turkey’s steel billet exports and imports increased by 33pc and 111pc, respectively, in January-July 2021 from the same period last year, according to statistical source SteelData.
Turkish producers exported 538,000mt of semis during the period under review versus 406,000mt in the first seven months of 2020 amid better demand at foreign outlets. Billet shipments to Morocco dropped by 48pc to 177,000mt, against the same period last year, but rose more than three-fold to 94,000mt to Peru. Turkey’s semis exports to Tunisia increased by 75pc to 57,000mt.
Turkish companies supplied 51,000mt of billet to Guatemala in January-July 2021, 45,000mt to China, 45,000mt to Taiwan, and 24,000mt to the Dominican Republic, while there were no shipments to these countries in January-July 2020.
Turkey’s billet imports totaled 2.11mn mt during the period under review compared to 998,000mt in the same timeframe of 2020, according to SteelData. The supply of semis from Russia doubled to 1.23mn mt and increased by 10pc to 333,000mt from Ukraine during this annual timeframe. Besides, Turkey imported 157,000mt of billet from Algeria in the first seven months of this year, 97,000mt of semis from Qatar, and 92,000mt from Oman.
In July, steel billet exports from Turkey totaled 38,000mt, up 26pc on an annual basis, and import of semis increased by 53pc to 242,000mt compared to the same month last year.