With various pro-active measures taken by the Centre to make India as one of the largest steel producers in the world, the Government is planning to reduce steel imports by over 40 per cent this fiscal, a move is aimed at reducing dependence and increasing demand for exports with maximum domestic production.
“As the demand for steel in the country is on the rise and the performance of the industry has been improved in the last six months, our effort is to cut down the steel imports further by over 40 per cent this financial year. This will not only help increase the demand for exports but also cut down the dependence on imports from other countries,” sources close to the development told The Pioneer on Tuesday.
“The import has been reduced significantly during 2016-17 due to the anti-dumping duty imposed by the Central Government to encourage domestic output in the steel industry of the country,” sources added.
For last few months, the Government has been taking various growth-oriented and productive actions to promote this sector in some way or the other. The steel production in the country stood at 90 million tonnes last year. Now, it has set a target for the production of steel in the country at 300 million tonnes by 2030 from the present 124 millions tonnes.
However, Steel Minister Chaudhary Birender Singh said, “As far as consumption is concerned, we are now at 65 kg per capita while at the world level is at 204 per capita. We want to take it forward to 160. If we can increase it in the next two-three years and we touch 80 kg per capita consumption, then it would be a big success story for us.”
As per data released by the International Stainless Steel Forum (ISSF) in Tokyo last week, India has emerged as the second largest stainless steel producer in the world after China. India overtook Japan as the second-biggest producer in 2016 as well.
“No doubt, India is heading towards becoming the second largest steel producer in the world. Production capacity till now is 124 million tonnes and this year, we were nearing 100 million tonnes. In the next two-three years, I hope that our target would be 175 million tonnes and by 2030-31, the ultimate goal of the Steel Ministry is 300 million tones,” Singh said in an event here, while highlighting 3-years of achievements and the road ahead for the sector.
“The Ministry is aiming to take the exports figures to double digits and India would be the largest steel exporter in the world in the next two to three years,” he said, adding that in 2016-17 India became net exporter of steel with 8.2 million tonnes of exports, registering a 102 per cent growth over previous fiscal.
“During the same fiscal, imports were reduced by 37 per cent at 7.42 million tonnes as a result of Government initiatives. India added 16.5 million tonnes of crude steel capacity during past three years,” he added.
Meanwhile, the Minister said the proposed joint venture (JV) between World’s largest steelmaker ArcelorMittal and domestic giant Steel Authority of India limited (SAIl) is in final stages and may be finalised this month.
SAIl and ArcelorMittal have inked an agreement to set up a Rs 5,000-crore auto-grade steel plant. “The ArcelorMittal and SAIl joint venture is at the final stages and is progressing fast. The project may be finalised this month,” Singh said, adding that the proposed JV will produce high-end steel based on latest technology.
Besides, the Minister also said, SAIl is working on 3 important projects in three States - Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Himachal Pradesh - and hopefully, all of them will be functional in next 2-12 months.