China produced 36 million tons of stainless steel. In 2023, exports from China exceeded 3 million tons and imports to China were about 2 million tons in 2023.
In 2023, China’s stainless steel production increased by 12.6 percent from 2022 to 36 million tonnes. The data was published by the China Stainless Steel Association in a subsidiary of the China Specialized Steel Association.
Data from the Chinese Stainless Steel Association indicates that the country’s stainless steel exports in 2023 were estimated at 4.14 million tons, compared with 4.55 million tons in 2022. Imports of this product to China were 2.7 million tons in 2023 and 3.28 million tons in 2022.
China’s stainless steel production capacity has reached 50 million tons per year and the utilization rate of this capacity has been announced at 70 percent. In 2024, about 13 million tonnes of this capacity is expected to be operational.
GMK Center earlier reported that in 2022 global stainless steel production fell 5.2 percent from 2021 to 55.3 million tons, while global production was projected to grow 4 percent from 2021 to 58.6 million tonnes.
MEPS predicted that global stainless steel production would reach 60 million tons by 2023, and that stainless steel producers in China and Indonesia would make a significant contribution to that volume.
In the nine months of 2023 (January to September), global stainless steel production increased by about 2.5 percent from the same period from 2022 to 42.6 million tonnes.