Posted on 29 Mar 2022
As of late Monday, raw materials deliveries by truck to local steelmakers in Tangshan, China's top steel production city in North China's Hebei province, continued to be plagued by disruptions as local authorities wage their battle against resurging cases of COVID-19 in the city of 7.7 million residents, according to market sources.
"We were able to secure 'vehicle passes' that allows our trucks to pass through roadblocks for transporting our raw materials, but these operations are restricted to only night hours," an official with a Tangshan-based steelmaker remarked on Monday. "In any case, the COVID checks for drivers on the roads are still very strict and take some time, which also slows the pace of transportation in general," he said.
However, his company is maintaining its blast furnace production by relying on inhouse stocks of raw materials and those materials that can be delivered by rail where disruptions are few, he insisted.
In any case, another Shanghai-based market source close to Tangshan's local steel mills also noted that only a few mills managed to receive approval for such vehicle passes. Consequently, as of Monday there had been no major changes to the overall raw materials trucking situation in the city.
Tangshan had imposed traffic controls on all roads in its administrative area since March 20, with only those vehicles for special or emergency use being allowed to pass. By last Friday, some local mills whose raw materials stocks had been rather low originally had gradually reduced their blast furnaces operations, as reported.
According to official statistics, Tangshan's steelmakers host over 126 blast furnaces which contributed to 13% of the country's total pig iron output or 113.8 million tonnes in 2021.
Source:Mysteel Global
