In 2023, China's steel industry will operate basically smoothly and high-quality development will be promoted in an orderly manner, but the phased difficulties such as insufficient recovery of traditional demand, prominent contradictions between supply and demand, and declining profits will also make the industry face "labor pains" caused by transformation and adjustment. In 2024, what changes will be ushered in in the supply, demand and development direction of China's steel market?How should the steel industry achieve high-quality development?From December 14th to 17th, at the "2024 Great Changes, New Momentum China Steel Market Outlook and 'My Steel' Annual Conference" held in Shanghai, experts, scholars and business representatives attending the meeting summarized and looked forward to the development of the industry, and analyzed the hot spots and focuses of the industry from multiple angles.
After more than 40 years of rapid development of reform and opening up, China's iron and steel industry has significantly improved its influence in the world, significantly enhanced its industrial independence, and made an increasing contribution to the development of the world's steel industry. He Wenbo, Secretary of the Party Committee and Executive Chairman of China Iron and Steel Association, said that China's iron and steel industry not only realizes its own development, but also supports the rapid development of downstream industries and goes global. According to the estimation of experts of the China Iron and Steel Association, in recent years, China's annual exports of mechanical and electrical products contain more than 100 million tons of steel. At present, with the rapid increase in the coverage and penetration rate of green and intelligent in the whole industry, China's steel industry is entering a new stage of development.
Looking back on China's steel market in 2023, Ren Zhuqian, vice president and senior researcher of Shanghai Iron and Steel Federation, said that steel continued to show a stepwise downward trend throughout the year, raw materials were stronger than steel, and the industry's benefits reached a new low. On the demand side, China's apparent crude steel consumption is expected to increase slightly year-on-year in 2023, with direct and indirect exports being the main force supporting crude steel consumption. Among them, automobiles, home appliances, containers and shipbuilding and other industries support the obvious growth of indirect steel exports.
Looking forward to 2024, Ren Zhuqian expects that the increase in overseas steel consumption will slow down, and China's steel exports may now decline year-on-yearDomestic steel consumption is basically flat year-on-year, and the variety structure continues to be upgraded and adjusted. "The biggest variable in the industry is still supply, and with the support of domestic and foreign demand has not increased, a moderate reduction in supply can gradually improve the efficiency of the industry. ”
In terms of raw materials, it is expected that global iron ore production will increase by 62 million tons year-on-year in 2024, and consumption will increase by 26 million tonsThe growth rate of coking coal production may slow down, and ** continue to remain accommodative;Coke production capacity continues to be high, and the first is weak;The supply of scrap steel has increased moderately, and it has been running smoothly.
Ren Zhuqian believes that the biggest problem facing the development of China's steel industry is the low concentration and high dependence of iron on foreign countries. Only by reducing the amount can the industry achieve high-quality development.
He Wenbo also emphasized that effective growth is an inevitable requirement for the high-quality development of the steel industry. China's steel consumption structure has been continuously optimized, the proportion of steel consumption in the manufacturing industry has continued to increase, and the steel market has shown strong resilience. At present, the total consumption of steel has reached its peak, from speed to quality, from total to variety, the transformation of the focus of the industry's work is underway. He Wenbo believes that it is necessary for the steel industry to consider accelerating the introduction of carbon constraints and re-evaluating the effectiveness of "production capacity" governance. Among the various pathways to decarbonize steel, vigorously promoting the recycling of recycled steel should be the first choice. At this stage, the cost-effective and recyclable characteristics of steel materials are far from being fully developed and utilized, and the space for material upgrading and material substitution is unlimited and there is a long way to go.
The oversupply market requires companies in the steel industry to have data-driven decision-making capabilities to have a keener insight into the market pulse and adjust their business strategies more flexibly. This year, Shanghai Ganglian upgraded its standardized data processing system. At the meeting, Shanghai Ganglian's "Ganglian Grandmaster" large language model for the bulk commodity industry and the "Xiaogang" digital intelligent assistant were also released. Zhu Junhong, chairman of Shanghai Ganglian, said that Shanghai Ganglian will continue to launch innovative products and solutions to help enterprise users quickly integrate AI capabilities to better cope with market uncertainty and create more significant competitive advantages.
Looking forward to the development of upstream mining resources, Shi Yi, deputy director of the Zheshang ** Research Institute and chief analyst of new metal materials, said that in the next three years, the resource performance will be stronger. The mining industry needs heavy asset investment, high return on equity to give rise to positive prospecting behavior, win-win thinking and the resource endowment of the "Belt and Road" countries will help China successfully explore the "Belt and Road" market. Shi Yi believes that China's resource enterprises will continue to go abroad, and the "going to sea" of leading mining enterprises is expected to drive the entire metal industry chain such as blasting, mining, shipping, green power installation, and battery energy storage to "go global". ESG will be a must for "going global".
In the face of great changes, He Wenbo said that the steel industry should focus on the fundamental task of improving the basic capacity of the industry and the level of the industrial chain, adhere to green development and intelligent manufacturing, focus on solving the industry pain points of controlling capacity expansion, promoting industrial concentration and ensuring resource safety, and continue to promote the internationalization process of China's steel industry.
Reporter Tang Li.