Tehran Times - The annual production capacity of Iranian steel sections producers has reached 47 million tons, while the figure was expected to reach 45 million tons by the current Iranian calendar year 1399 (started on March 20), IRNA reported.

Based on the Industry, Mining, and Trade Ministry’s data, there are currently 148 steel section production units nationwide and the total production capacity of these units is expected to rise 46 million tons by the Iranian calendar year of 1404 (starts in March 2025).

The country’s steel section producers manufactured 20.514 million tons of the products in the previous calendar year to register a 4.5-percent rise compared to the preceding year’s 19.639 million tons.

According to the mentioned data, the total capacity of the country’s active units in addition to the feasible and probable projects stands at 65.3 million tons.

The industry ministry’s data indicates that if the country’s feasible and probable projects go operational by the Iranian calendar year 1404, Iran would have 19.3 million tons of surplus steel section production which can be exported to other countries.

Iran is the tenth-largest steelmaker in the world and steel sections are among the country’s most exported items to the neighboring countries.

The country’s crude steel production increased by 30 percent in 2019 while the average global growth in this sector stood at 3.5 percent, according to a report released by the World Steel Association (WSA).

Based on the WSA report, Iran produced 31.9 million tons of the mentioned commodity during 2019 compared to the last year’s nearly 24 million tons.

Iran, which stood at the 13th place in 2017, passed over three major steel producers in the world, namely Italy, Taiwan, and Ukraine to stand at the 10th place in 2018 despite the re-imposition of sanctions by the U.S.