Posted on 23 Oct 2026
Crude steel production among China's top 10 steelmaking provinces and autonomous regions totaled 518.88 million tonnes over January-September, slipping by 2.9% compared with the first nine months of last year, according to the latest data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
The rate of decrease slowed slightly from the 3% decline seen in the January-August data, mainly due to the marginal recovery in crude steel output in these provinces in September. During last month alone, production of crude steel among the top steel hubs had increased by 1.7% on year to reach 51.75 million tonnes, the NBS figures showed.
The result was in line with China's nationwide crude steel output for September, which ticked up by a tiny 0.1% on year to reach 73.59 million tonnes, as Mysteel Global reported.
Among the ten centers, half posted increases in crude steel output last month, with North China's Hebei province – the country's top steelmaking base – posting the largest on-year growth of 15.9%.
The large rises in steel output in some major centers last month mainly reflected a keener enthusiasm for production among steelmakers at that time, especially in the first half of the month, Mysteel Global noted. This was when improved finished steel prices and industry hopes for a pickup in steel demand with the arrival of autumn led many steelmakers to scale up production.
For example, during the first two weeks of September the national price of HRB400E 20mm dia rebar averaged Yuan 3,335/tonne ($500/t), up by Yuan 79/t or 2.4% from the August average of Yuan 3,242/t, according to Mysteel's assessment.
Meanwhile, daily crude steel output among the member mills of the China Iron and Steel Association (CISA) rose during September 1-10, with the tonnage edging up by 2% or 39,000 t/d from the last eleven days of August to average 1.92 million t/d, as reported.
However, as actual steel consumption fell short of expectations, production dropped a notch in the second half, with daily crude steel output among the CISA member mills decreasing by 2.1% or 41,000 tonnes/day from the middle ten days of September to average 1.88 million t/d during September 21-30.
Looking at overall January-September data, crude steel output in most of the ten hubs still declined, a fact pointing to Beijing's efforts since 2025 to curb crude steel production.
However, South China's Guangdong stands out as an exception. The province's crude steel output during the first nine months rose by 3.2% on year to 31.12 million tonnes, though this had narrowed from the 5.6% increase for January-July and 4.2% for January-August, the NBS findings indicate.
The increase attracted criticism from Beijing, especially after a central government-selected ecological and environmental protection inspection team identified illegalities among certain Guangdong mills.
"Some steel enterprises (in Guangdong) failed to implement the steel capacity replacement requirements, arbitrarily enlarging the volume of electric furnaces during renovation, and illegally adding crude steel production capacity," the inspection team pointed out in a notice published by Guangdong Provincial Department of Ecological Environment on September 18.
Source:Mysteel Global
