French port sees steel export increase in June

The Port of Marseille in Fos-sur-Mer saw some positive signs in steel and breakbulk traffic towards the end of June. Exports of steel products rebounded by 2% on June 2019 after the quiet period of European lockdown, Kallanish learns from the port authority.

In the first half of 2020 the port saw overall traffic fall by -15% due to the global pandemic. In 2019 it had a turnover of over €169 million ($190m) and total traffic reached 79 million tonnes. Last year it received 257,721 tonnes of metallurgical products, while 109,154t were shipped from the port.

To stimulate the recovery, the Port of Marseille Fos Supervisory Board has decided to maintain its €57m capital expenditure for this year and support its customers affected by the health crisis. This includes increasing container terminal capacity and implementing the Fos-Graveleau rail link project, which consists of connecting more container terminals to improve train traffic.

French exports of flat and long steel to non-EU countries fell -33.1% on-year in March to 101,000t, after declining in January and February (see Kallanish passim).