The World Steel Association expects global "steel demand" to continue to grow this year and next year

The World Steel Association released a short-term steel demand forecast report, predicting that global steel demand will rebound by 1.7% in 2024 to 1.793 billion tons; global steel demand will increase by 1.2% in 2025 to 1.815 billion tons.From 2024 to 2025, global steel demand will continue to grow.

As for China, the World Steel Association expects China's steel demand in 2024 to remain roughly at the 2023 level. Although the continued decline in real estate investment has led to a corresponding decline in steel demand, the demand growth brought by infrastructure investment and manufacturing will offset the decline in the real estate industry; in 2025, China's steel demand is expected to fall by 1%, far below the peak demand in 2020.

From 2024 to 2025, steel demand in other countries around the world except China is expected to grow by 3.5% annually. Specifically, from 2024 to 2025, affected by local infrastructure investment, India's steel demand will continue to grow by 8%, and the steel demand in 2025 is expected to be nearly 70 million tons more than in 2020; after the slowdown in 2022-2023, the steel demand in other emerging economies such as the Middle East, North Africa and ASEAN is expected to accelerate in 2024-2025, among which ASEAN is affected by political instability and other factors, and the growth rate of steel demand in the future is expected to slow down further; the steel demand in developed economies will grow by 1.3% and 2.7% in 2024 and 2025 respectively, among which the EU steel demand is expected to recover substantially in 2025, and the United States, Japan and South Korea will also maintain steel demand resilience. It should be noted that public infrastructure investment aimed at strengthening infrastructure construction, resisting climate change risks and carrying out post-disaster reconstruction is an important factor supporting the growth of steel demand in major steel-using countries such as Japan, South Korea and Turkey in 2023. The World Steel Association emphasized that although public infrastructure investment and manufacturing investment will remain strong, high construction costs and labor shortages may constrain future growth in public infrastructure investment and manufacturing investment in the short term.