Spain’s 2022 imports fall but exceed 15-year average

Spain saw a year-on-year fall in steel imports in 2022, in line with the global trend and overall domestic trade, says local steelmakers’ association Unesid in its latest report monitored by Kallanish.

The fall was mainly the result of a reduction in imports from EU countries. These, however, represented 57% of Spanish apparent steel consumption last year, Unesid says.

“2022 was a particularly turbulent year for economic activity, marked by both geopolitical tensions and widespread inflation that fuelled higher energy prices,” Unesid statistics and market expert Alejandro Arnao observes. The global trade deceleration was more visible during the second half of the year, impacting Spanish steel imports.

Steel entries into the country fell by 2.5% year-on-year to 9.8 million tonnes in 2022. This volume, however, is one of the highest registered in recent years, and even exceeds by 500,000 tonnes the annual average of imports in the last 15 years, according to Unesid data.

The most demanded steel from abroad was hot rolled coil, with 2.7mt of intake, down 1.9%. Coated sheet amounted to 1.9mt (-9.8%). In terms of volume, EU-origin steel imports fell 7% to 5.7mt, due mainly to a 13.9% reduction in French supply, while Italian shipments dropped 3.9%.

The overall increase in imports from third countries was 4.3% y-o-y to 4.2mt in 2022. Asia, including the Oceania region, had a 30.8% share, supplying almost 2.5mt to Spain. A 28.4% increase was observed for Taiwan-origin entries (526,000t). Japan supplied 406,000t, up 130.4% y-o-y, while China delivered 35.1% more steel in 2022 at 370,000t. Imports from South Korea reached 290,000t, up 42.8%.

Meanwhile, entries from non-EU and African countries respectively fell by 29.3% and 14.2%, mainly as a result of the impact of the war in Ukraine and quota adjustment of imports from Egypt after the high levels registered in 2021.

“Third-party suppliers have consolidated the recovery that began in 2021,” exceeding the 15-year average “despite safeguard measures and weak demand for steel in Spain,” Arnao comments. “Intense international competition in recent years, unfair in certain cases, has led to a greater diversification of suppliers, thus reducing the concentration of the main origins of Spanish steel imports.”

Todor Kirkov Bulgaria