Italian steel plants slowly resume production, deliveries: trade

Most leading Italian steel mills have begun to resume production and deliveries this week, sources said, adding that facilities have been granted permission by local prefectures despite the industry not formally having been included on the list of sectors approved to restart operations by the central government.

The government signed a decree just before the Easter break aimed at starting to loosen restrictions brought in to stem the spread of the coronavirus after five weeks of lockdown in the country, although it did not formally name the steel sector as part of this.

Italy is Europe’s second-largest steel producer, producing 23 million mt/year of crude steel. But unlike most other European countries, many of Italy’s mills stopped production on March 25, with the only exceptions being ArcelorMittal Italia in Taranto and Arvedi.

“It is important for the supply chain that mills re-open and most of them in agreement not only with their local prefects but also with the unions are re-opening. Considering that it is a slow re-opening, workers are safe as the space in the mills is big and the distance between workers is being respected as well as the sanitizing of the spaces…We have to start to cohabit with this virus so we can’t shut down everything and lose market share,” one industry source said.

“We can certainly say that all these mills and others have moved the first steps to restart, as most of them stopped production for around three weeks and had time to plan a safe and gradual re-start,” another source said. “In order to take the decision to reopen each mill has to analyze their balance sheet and consider the benefit to re-open at such low rate considering their fixed costs but also the defense of their maker share.”

— Annalisa Villa