Steel production may increase to 10m tons

KARACHI: Steel production is expected to increase to 10 million tons by the year 2015 and 20 million tons by 2020 under the new policy evolved by the government. This new policy has been evolved in consultation with all the industry stakeholders, according to In charge of Steel Segment, Engineering Development Board, S M Adil Shah.

He revealed this while addressing the second Iron and Steel Conference 2010 organised by Sken Business Management Service here.

Steel production units are not fully utilised and functioning under capacity and the difference between demand and supply has increased to 2.5 to three million tons, which is being met through import, he said.

He said that the country has steel production capacity of four million tons per annum as compared to total demand of over six million tons.

Tuwairqi Steel Mills (TSM) will help minimise the demand and supply gap, according to its consultant, Ali Akhtar Khan.

He explained that it was implementing modern systems to enhance steel production.

Adil Shah also said that the steel industry is directly linked with the international market where iron and steel prices are on the rise and that the country needs to follow the trend.

He added that the steel sector needs to be expanded for which huge money is required.

Besides, it has some pre-requisites which including security of investment, security of foreign experts, availability of raw materials and uninterrupted supply of electricity.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 11^th, 2010.