Posted on 14 Oct 2020
Lebanon’s steel market continues to suffer due to political and financial crises in the country, exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic and the devastating blast in Beirut in August. But there are signs of recovery, local traders tell Kallanish.
“For the last couple of weeks there have been exports of rebar [to Lebanon] mostly from Turkey and very few from Ukraine,” a merchant says. “Local clients are still interested in imports of rebar not only because of domestic demand, but also from neighbouring countries.”
One of the most recent shipments was at the end of last week for 20,000 tonnes of rebar at $430-450/tonne fob Turkey.
However, in the first nine months of the year Lebanon imported only 160,000t of rebar, down by -77% on-year, another trader says. He hopes for future construction projects after the blast in Beirut, which will increase demand for rebar and other steel.
Lebanese overall imports of rebar slumped -42% on-year in 2019 to 343,132t, according to Customs data. The main supplier was Ukraine with 113,314t, down -47%. Intake from Turkey, however, rose 3% to 105,539t. Rebar imports from Saudi Arabia totalled only 38,732t versus 182,385t in 2018. These were to some extent replaced with intake from Iran which was 32,201t in 2019 compared to zero a year earlier.
Source:Kallanish
