In March this year, domestic steel product consumption in Japan amounted to 3.73 million metric tons, up by 4.2 percent compared to February and down by 4.7 percent year on year, according to the data released by the Japan Iron and Steel Association (JISF). Meanwhile, in the January-March period, domestic steel consumption in the country decreased by 1.2 percent year on year to 11.14 million metric tons.
In the first three months of the given year, steel product consumption in the construction sector in Japan moved down by 4.3 percent to 2.16 million metric tons, while steel product consumption in the Japanese automotive sector amounted to 2.63 million metric tons, down 4.2 percent, both on year-on-year basis. In the given period, Japan’s shipbuilding industry consumed 736,072 metric tons of steel products, up 4.1 percent compared to the same period of the previous year.