Japan Stainless Steel Association’s chairman Hiroshi Kinoshita said to a reporter of Japan Metal Bulletin said world stainless demand should increase with further energy development and improving living level. The president of Nippon Steel & Sumikin Stainless Steel (NSSC) said Japanese stainless industry should improve the technology and products level and efficiency while the makers should consolidate themselves for better efficiency to contribute to the growing demand.
Mr. Kinoshita said stainless demand decreased by 10-15% from the recent peak before Lehman shock. He expects the low level domestic demand wouldn’t recover in short term due to slower building activity and offshore shift by automakers and appliances makers. However, he said world stainless consumption has increased for past 30 years at annualized more than 6% growth rate, which is higher than world economy growth rate. He expects the demand keeps increasing especially in China and Southeast Asia. Mr. Kinoshita said stainless industry can develop the new applications instead of other materials by utilizing the advantage in corrosion resistance, longer life, recyclability and beautiful surface. He said the association should appeal stainless’ advantage as the task. He tries to increase new stainless users for better value for the users by utilizing the advantage. Mr. Kinoshita said Japanese stainless industry should follow growing offshore demand especially in East Asia. He said Japanese industry can utilize advanced technology to develop the emerging market while Japanese makers cannot compete with offshore rivals in commodity grade products including SUS304 grade due to high yen rate and environmental investment cost. Mr. Kinoshita said volatile price of raw materials impacts on stainless makers’ profitability and potential users’ purchase attitude when nickel and chrome price level is much higher and more volatile than before under growing stainless demand in emerging countries. He said Japanese stainless makers should develop higher valued products to cope with the raw materials situation. He believes the makers’ effort to develop nickel saving stainless and chrome saving stainless grades contributes to wider stainless demand at home and abroad.