Japan Copper Scrap Import Increases to 57,000t in 2006

Japanese copper scrap import increased by 22.7% to 57,225 tonnes in 2006 from 2005, while brass and bronze scrap import increased by 22.4% to 30,774 tonnes and copper alloy scrap by 5.5%, announced Ministry of Finance on Tuesday. The imports increased when domestic copper rolled products makers kept high operations.The import of cathode copper kept almost as flat as 2005, which increased by 0.5% to 73,405 tonnes in 2006 from 2005. Domestic copper fabricators seemed to purchase copper ingot as much as immediate demand when domestic official copper ingot price hit record 1 million yen per tonne in May 2006 and stayed at around 900,000 yen for a few months.The import of aluminium alloy ingot increased by 15% to 1.14 million tonnes in 2006 from 2005. Domestic makers of secondary aluminium alloy ingot kept full operations when Japanese automakers continued active productions. The import of aluminium alloy scrap also increased by 25.2% to 126,704 tonnes.