BIR World Mirror on Ferrous Metals - Quarterly Report - March 2011


PRESIDENT’S REMARKS

Dear colleagues and friends,

In these days, our thoughts are with Japan, the Japanese people and our Japanese colleagues and business partners. JISRI, the Japan Iron & Steel Recycling Institute, has established a relief fund for the most damaged Tohoku region and for those JISRI members working and living there. BIR as well as my German steel recycling federation BDSV will be contributing to this fund and I would like to call on all of you to show your solidarity too.

2010 was an excellent year for the ferrous recycling industry. Combined exports from the USA and the EU again reached almost record levels. Nevertheless, we cannot close our eyes to the fact that the world economic situation is still very vulnerable. Political turmoil - for instance, in North Africa and the Middle East - has an enormous impact on our industry. For example, Egypt became a major scrap importing country in 2010, and yet its future in terms of political and economic developments remains unclear.

Russia is planning a further restriction of its overseas scrap shipments by closing the St Petersburg scrap export terminal. The EU’s major, traditional importing countries from St Petersburg are Spain, the Netherlands, France, Finland and Germany. Russia’s political decision in favour of its domestic steel mills, and especially the state-owned mills, will most probably shift Turkish imports to the EU.(...)

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