The domestic steel production is expected to gain year-on-year growth of about 20 per cent this year, according to the Ministry of Industry and Trade.

Of which, production will increase by 10 per cent for construction steel, 5 per cent for cold rolled steel sheet, 15 per cent for welding steel and 12 per cent for galvanised steel.

Especially, hot rolled steel production is expected to increase the most at 154 per cent against last year. This is because Formosa Ha Tinh plans to double its production capacity when the second blast furnace, with a capacity of 4 million tonnes per year, will come into operation in the second half of the year. That will push the total capacity of Fomosa Ha Tinh up to 7-8 million tonnes per year.

In addition, some other projects are planned to be put into operation this year, such as Hoa Phat Group’s rolled steel project with capacity of 600,000 tonnes, starting operation in August and Hoa Sen Group’s production line with a capacity of 350,000 tonnes. Meanwhile, Tung Ho Company will put a production line of construction steel into operation with a total capacity of 600,000 tonnes, reports tinnhanhchungkhoan.vn.

According to Nguyen Van Sua, vice chairman of the Viet Nam Steel Association, with such favourable factors, Viet Nam’s steel industry this year will maintain growth to gain a surge of 20 per cent in production over last year.

However, the steel industry still faces many difficulties and challenges, including trade protectionism, which means countries implement tariff barriers to reduce imports of goods from other countries, including Viet Nam.

Viet Nam’s export steel products face lawsuits in the US, Australia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and India.

This is a challenge requiring enterprises to meet sustainable production growth to reach the export target of 5 million tonnes this year.

According to the ministry, iron and steel output in the first six months of the year was about 4.69 million tonnes, a year-on-year increase of 7 per cent.

The cause for the positive trend in this period was the continued growth of the domestic economy. Many infrastructure and real estate projects have started construction in the first half of this year.

At the same time, disbursement of public investment capital by the Government in the first months of the year also created good conditions for the growth of the steel industry. — VNS