World Steel Association forecast global steel demand to grow by 5.8% in 2021

According to the world iron and Steel Association's official website, the world iron and Steel Association released the latest short-term (2021-2022) steel demand forecast report on the 15th. The report shows that global steel demand will increase by 5.8% to 1.874 billion tons in 2021 after a decline of 0.2% in 2020. In 2022, global steel demand will continue to grow by 2.7% to 1.925 billion tons.
  According to the report, the second or third wave of the epidemic, which is still going on, will be leveled off in the second quarter of this year. With the steady progress of vaccination, the economic activities of major steel consuming countries will gradually return to normal.
"Novel coronavirus pneumonia is still lucky for the world's steel industry, but the global steel demand will only shrink slightly by the end of 2020," Al Remeithi, chairman of the World Steel Association's Market Research Committee, commented on the forecast. This is mainly due to the surprisingly strong recovery in China, which has driven the growth of steel demand in China as high as 9.1%, while in the rest of the world, steel demand has shrunk by 10.0%. In the next few years, the steel demand of developed and developing economies will recover steadily. The supporting factors are the restrained steel demand and the government's economic recovery plan. However, it will take several years for some of the most developed economies to return to the pre epidemic level.
When it comes to the construction industry in the steel industry, the report said that affected by the epidemic situation, different development trends will appear in various fields of the construction industry. With the increase of telecommuting and e-commerce, as well as the decrease of business travel, people's demand for commercial buildings and travel facilities will continue to decline. At the same time, people's demand for e-commerce logistics facilities has increased, and this demand will develop into a growth sector. Infrastructure projects have increased in importance and sometimes become the only means for many countries to revive their economies. In emerging economies, infrastructure projects will continue to be a strong driver. In developed economies, green recovery plan projects and infrastructure renovation projects will boost construction demand. It is expected that by 2022, the global construction industry will return to the level of 2019.
The report also said that globally, among the steel industry, the decline of the automobile industry is the most significant, and the automobile industry is expected to have a strong recovery in 2021. It is expected that the global automobile industry will return to the level of 2019 in 2022. Although the global machinery industry is hit by the decline in investment in 2020, the decline is far lower than that in 2009. It is expected that the machinery industry will recover quickly. In addition, another important factor will also affect the machinery industry, that is, the acceleration of digitization and automation process. Investment in this area will drive the growth of the machinery industry. Moreover, green projects and investment plans in the field of renewable energy will become another growth area of the machinery industry.