International Forum on Metallurgical Capacities Fails
Kita withdrew from negotiations with other countries on the continuation of the work of the International Forum, designed to solve the problem of excess capacities of the world metallurgy.
While most attendees wanted to extend the forum until next month, China said the organization had achieved its goal and should cease its activities, Japanese Industry Minister Hiroshi Kajiyama, who chairs a meeting of the International Forum on Overweight, told reporters in Tokyo. steel production facilities.
Governments of various countries discussed this issue at a ministerial meeting in Japan.
Overcapacity is a matter of controversy, and China, which produces half of the world's steel, is generally blamed by other countries for generating such capacity. The country has said it is restructuring its industry and curbing oversupply. At the last meeting of the forum, a decrease in global steel consumption was predicted, and it is believed that this year the demand outside China will almost stop.
Ahead of the forum, more than a dozen industry groups from Europe, North America and Asia have called for an extension, accusing China of further expanding its metallurgical capacity.
While China's steel industry reforms have made progress, the problem of illegal new capacity has re-emerged, Xing Tao, deputy director of the raw materials department of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, said in September. Some companies are continuously producing steel even with environmental risks, and supplies have grown too fast, he said. The country's steel production is up 8.4% this year.
Forum Chairman Kajiyama said on Saturday that forum participants fully share the need to continue to work to reduce overcapacity and ensure that future efforts to achieve this goal are carried out through an "open platform" that can include members of the G-20 and OECD.
According to a statement from the Japanese Ministry of Commerce, citing data from the OECD and the World Steel Association, global production has doubled since 2000. Excess steel capacity has been cut from a peak of 700 million tonnes in 2015 to 400 million tonnes, four times Japan's total annual production, the ministry said.