Japan’s steel exports up 1.3 percent in August

Japan's iron and steel product exports in August this year amounted to 3.72 million metric tons, rising by 1.3 percent year on year and up 2.4 percent compared to July this year, while Japan's steel imports totaled 670,185 metric tons, with a month-on-month increase of 1.1 percent and a year-on-year increase of one percent, according to the customs statistics released by the Japanese Ministry of Finance.
 
In the meantime, in the first eight months of the current year, Japanese steel exports amounted to 29.7 million mt, rising 5.7 percent, while Japanese steel imports came to 4.88 million mt, decreasing by 7.5 percent, both compared to the January-August period of the previous year.
 
Regarding Japan's major steel export markets, in the first eight months of this year the country's steel exports to South Korea totaled 5.4 million mt, down 5.8 percent, while steel exports to China decreased by 3.7 percent to 4 million metric tons; the export volume to Taiwan amounted to 2.7 million metric tons, up 19 percent; exports to Thailand totaled 3.85 million metric tons, up 12.4 percent; while exports to the US came to 1.6 million metric tons, decreasing by 6.4 percent, all compared to the same period of the previous year.
 
In the January-August period, Japan imported 2.3 million metric tons of steel from South Korea, down 10.4 percent, it imported 815,548 metric tons from China, down by 11.8 percent, while imports from Taiwan fell to 686,671 metric tons, increasing by 3.3 percent, all compared to the same period of the previous year.