Long steel products are not being protected sufficiently by European trade measures, Carlo Beltrame, chief executive at Beltrame Group – Donalam SRL, told delegates at the Kallanish Europe Steel Markets event in Amsterdam on 17 June.
“There is a different speed of interest in applying the protection measures between flat and long products,” he said. The recent EU safeguard tariff-rate quota revision gave priority to flat products, he added.
“Long products are not protected. Long products by electric arc furnaces are [considered a] class B producer. We are not … taken into consideration, even if we have decarbonised the process,” Beltrame commented.
He also questioned how producers in other countries can compete against the competitive energy costs seen in regions such as France and Spain.
However, fellow panellist Stanislav Zinchenko, ceo of GMK Center, said there was an opportunity for European producers to gain market share as imports of long products produced by blast furnace-basic oxygen furnace mills overseas will become blocked by the incoming CBAM regulation.
“Who will replace [these] imports – Turkey, MENA, or Italian producers? It’s a big question,” he noted. “CBAM creates some opportunity to replace imports, but who will support this replacement?”
“It’s a very challenging time for the European steel industry,” Zinchenko added.
Carrie Bone UK
