Nippon Steel Doubles Production Cut in 2H

Nippon Steel doubles the production cut to more than 4 million tonnes in October-March period from the original plan, said the president Shoji Muneoka on Friday. The firm announced more than 2 million tonnes of production cut in November. The firm stops no.1 blast furnace at Oita works in early February, which is more than one month ahead of original schedule. The firm also reduces the production through lower furnace operation and lower scrap uses. The firm imposes the largest ever cut to meet very slow demand when the users reduces the operations to meet slow demand and to reduce the inventory.

Mr. Muneoka said at the monthly press conference as chairman of Japan Iron and Steel Federation the firm estimates more than 4 million tonnes of production cut fro the second half year of fiscal 2008 is needed under current condition. He said the firm fixes the actual volume by the end of the month and indicates the cut could be 4.5 million tonnes or less.

Mr. Muneoka said the firm started study to stop no.1 furnace at Oita in early February, for which the firm planned to stop in early March and reline. He said the firm keeps the plan to restart the furnace in May. He said the firm doesn’t stop other blast furnace to reduce the output.

The firm planned 33 million tonnes of raw steel output in fiscal 2008 compared with 33.1 million tonnes in fiscal 2007. The firm revised the plan to reduce the production by around 1 million tonnes as of October and by more than 2 million tonnes as of November. The production in fiscal 2008 will decrease to less than 30 million tonnes for the first time in 4 years and to the lowest level after 26.14 million tonnes in fiscal 2001.