Steel consumption up 3.4% to 5.8 mn tonnes in April

New Delhi: India's steel consumption grew by 3.4 percent to 5.8 million tonnes in April 2014 over the same month a year ago.

It, however, witnessed a sharp 12.9 percent decline over the preceding month.

"India's consumption of total finished steel saw a growth of 3.4 percent in April 2014 over April 2013 and decline by 12.9 percent over March 2014," Joint Plant Committee (JPC), a unit of the Steel Ministry, said today.

Production of crude steel grew by 2.7 percent to 6.8 million tonnes during the month. India is the world's fourth largest steel producer.

Independent Steel Producers (ISPs) such as SAIL, RINL, Tata Steel, Essar Steel, JSW and JSPL together produced 3.7 million tonnes in April, while the remaining came from minor producers.

"Compared to March 2014, overall crude steel production declined by 5.6 percent in April 2014, led by steep decline of 8.9 percent in case of ISP producers and 1.3 percent decline in case of mini and other producers," JPC said.

Imports spurt 14.1 percent to 0.494 million tonnes, while exports saw an increase by 13 percent to 0.461 million tonnes during the month.

India consumed 73.9 million tonnes of finished steel during the last fiscal, clocking just a 0.6 percent growth over the previous fiscal, impacted primarily by the slowdown in the domestic economy and a sharp decline in imports.

The production of crude steel increased by 3.8 percent to 81.3 million tonnes in 2013-14.