Egypt's imports of iron raw materials decreased by 19% in September

Egypt's imports of iron raw materials decreased by about 19.1% during September, recording $327 million, compared to $405 million in the same period last year 2023, according to data from the external bulletin of the Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics. Ayman Al-Ashry, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Al-Ashry Steel Group, attributed the reasons for the decline to the lack of financing needed by companies to import production requirements and raw materials. Al-Ashry added to Al-Borsa that companies need financing with easy interest rates to support the return of importing raw materials so that they can operate at full production capacity. Mohamed Hanfy, Executive Director of the Chamber of Metallurgical Industries at the Federation of Industries, said that the decline in Egypt's primary imports of iron and steel is due to the decline in demand in the local market. Hanfy added to "Al Borsa" that most companies in the sector operate at rates ranging between 40 and 50% of their production capacity, except for Ezz Steel, whose production capacity reaches 80%. He noted that Egypt has about 35 factories for the production of iron and steel with a production capacity of 15 million tons, but the actual production does not exceed 8 million tons, while Egypt's consumption of iron reached 3.059 million tons during the first half of 2024. He pointed out that Egypt's iron exports recorded a decrease of 15.4% during the period from January to August 2024, reaching $1.368 billion compared to $1.617 billion in the same period of the previous year.