Major Turkish integrated long steel producer Kardemir, based in the Karabuk region of northern Turkey, has decided to partially reduce output due to adverse market conditions in the market arising from the globally expanding COVID-19 outbreak, S&P Global Platts learned.
“In line with the evaluations made, reducing employee density and with the aim of maximizing occupational safety and sustainable production; considering the adverse market conditions in the sector, it is decided to partially reduce the daily production level across the company by bringing forward various planned maintenance and repair activities,” the company said in a statement Wednesday evening, without giving further details about the level of the output cut.
All the necessary precautions have been taken for the supply/procurement safety of our stakeholders and additional precautions will be taken according to the pandemic/market developments to be faced, the company noted.
Kardemir currently has 2.5 million mt/year of liquid steel production capacity. Within the scope of the 3.5 million mt/year steel production capacity target as well as the performance increase and productivity, the company is targeting to start to build a new blast furnace with a capacity of 1 million mt/year.
Some Turkish longs producers have been similarly pausing their output while some have been reducing their capacity usages in recent days.
Turkey’s largest integrated steel producer Isdemir, Erdemir Metalurji Group’s Iskenderun-based mill, will also pause one of its blast furnaces for maintenance in the coming week, as S&P Global Platts has reported.
— Cenk Can
