Japan Small Steel Bar Export Jumps in March

Japanese small steel bar export increased to 83,509 tonnes in March, which is 3.8 times of same period of 2007, according to Ministry of Finance. Japanese small bar makers try to shift to export under very slow domestic building market. The export to South Korea jumped to around 3 times at 42,364 tonnes. The electric furnace billet export increased by 90% to 175,782 tonnes in March from a year earlier. The export increased by 64.7 % to 81,257 tonnes for South Korea, by 180% to 45,800 tonnes for Vietnam and by 157% to 45,480 tonnes for Taiwan. Japanese small bar output decreased by 5.1% to 1.006 million tonnes in March from a year earlier due to slower domestic demand while the output increased by 17.4% from February and reached 1 million tonnes for the first time in 5 months. The higher volume than previous 4 months was partly due to the higher export.