The GDP of the steel industry in Mexico plummeted 44.8 percent in the third quarter of the year, in real terms compared to the same period last year. It is the seventh consecutive quarterly contraction and the worst drop in Mexican steel history, according to SteelOrbis' analysis of data from the national statistics agency Inegi.
The current period of contraction was affected by the blockade for more than two months of part of ArcelorMittal Mexico's assets by the Miners' Union of Congressman Napoleón Gómez Urrutia. After the blockade, the reactivation of the blast furnace was delayed for another three months.
The Mexican economy registered an annual increase in its GDP of 1.6 percent. The industrial sector grew 0.5 percent (contributing 32.2 percent of the national GDP) and the manufacturing industry (contributing 19.9 percent of the national GDP) increased 1.1 percent.
The GDP of the steel industry is the reference for the Basic Iron and Steel Industry that integrates the steel complexes with the primary smelting of raw iron, steel manufacturing, ferroalloys, finished products such as tubes, posts, profiles, wire rod, cables, rods manufactured in the steel complexes. It also includes the manufacture of primary slabs (ingots, slabs, billets) from purchased pig iron.