TEHRAN- Iran has the capacity to export 15 million tons of steel per annum, a board member of the Iranian Steel Producers Association (ISPA) told IRNA on Monday.

Saying that the country’s annual steel production has reached 30 million tons, Reza Shahrestani stated that of this figure 15 million tons can be exported and bring $7 billion of revenue for the country.

“Iran is now among the world’s top ten steel producers and in order to prove our capabilities in this due, we should have a strong presence in the international markets”, he stressed.

While the price of exported steel used to be $400 per ton, the figure fell to $350, but the price’s been recovering and has reached $380, Shahrestani further announced. 

As previously reported, Iran’s export of steel products in the past Iranian calendar year (ended on March 19) rose 27 percent compared to its preceding year.

The country’s major steel producers managed to export about 7.33 million tons of the products in the previous year.

According to the data released by the Industry, Mining, and Trade Ministry, in the mentioned period over 20.226 million tons of steel ingots were produced by the country’s 10 major companies to register a five-percent rise year on year.

The mentioned companies also produced nearly 13.38 million tons of other steel products last year, six percent more than the preceding year.

In a bid to prevent the exports of unprocessed minerals, creating more value-added and meeting the requirements of domestic producers for the raw materials, Iran has levied a 25-percent duty on the exports of raw minerals (especially iron ore) since September 23, 2019.

Industry Ministry believes that the duty is going to encourage the production of more processed minerals such as pellets and concentrate instead of selling the raw minerals.

As Iranian Mines and Mining Industries Development and Renovation Organization (IMIDRO) has announced, Iran’s annual steel ingot production is planned to increase 3.2 million tons in the current Iranian calendar year, which began on March 20.

The country has defined 16 development projects in the steel sector to boost the output of steel products by 17.3 million tons in five years.

These projects are for constructing production units each with the capacity of 600,000 tons, while some other projects have been also defined to set up some units with under 500,000-ton capacity that together with the 600,000-ton capacity units will add 19.1 million tons to the country’s annual steel products output.

Citing the data indicated in the World Steel Association (WSA)’s latest report, IMIDRO has announced that the production of crude steel in Iran has risen 14.1 percent in March 2020 from March 2019.

The WSA’s report, which is on steel production by 64 countries, put Iran’s steel output at over 2.8 million tons in March.

WSA has previously announced that Iran’s crude steel production climbed 30 percent in 2019 while the average global growth in this sector stood at 3.5 percent.

According to the global organization, Iran produced 31.9 million tons of crude steel in 2019, while the figure was 24 million tons in 2018.

The data and reports released by Iranian organizations also show that the country’s steel sector is still experiencing growth in output and export despite the U.S. sanctions.

In its outlook plan for the Iranian calendar year 1404 (2025-2026) Iran has envisaged production of 55 million tons of steel per annum, and to achieve this target the country requires to produce 160 million tons of iron ore concentrates. 

Industry, Mining, and Trade Ministry has announced that production of iron ore concentrate in Iran reached 47.306 million tons in the previous Iranian calendar year, registering a four-percent rise compared to the preceding year.

The country has extracted 64.274 million tons of iron ore during the past year, according to the data released by Iranian Mines and Mining Industries Development and Renovation Organization.

MA/MA