New Delhi, June 20 (IANS) India’s per‑capita steel consumption at around 90 kilograms per person annually far below the global average leaves substantial headroom for growth and the country is beginning to close, a new report has said.

Compared with China’s per-capita steel intensity peak of 600 kilograms during its construction boom, India has a lot of room for growth, which will be driven by investment in railways, highways, urban transit systems, and renewable energy infrastructure, the report from Vietnam Times said.

The report said such investments are driving demand across multiple categories of steel, from construction‑grade long products to flat steel for industrial use.

India’s steel demand structure is more resilient than China’s historic property‑driven boom, with growth spread across infrastructure, manufacturing and energy transition sectors.

“China’s steel boom was overwhelmingly property-concentrated, which created both extraordinary growth and extraordinary,” the report said.

Major miners such as BHP and Rio Tinto view India as driving steel’s next wave of growth precisely because of this diversified demand base.

India’s steel industry is also predominantly blast furnace-based consuming iron ore and metallurgical coal as primary feedstocks rather than relying on scrap-fed electric arc furnaces.

Iron ore exporters can benefit from such an industry base because blast furnace steelmaking requires substantial ore inputs per tonne of finished steel. Consequently, India becomes a high-quality demand replacement for Australian and Brazilian iron ore producers, the report noted.

Southeast Asia’s collective steel demand is expected to roughly double in a decade from current due to rapid industrialisation across countries.

“Unlike China’s concentrated demand, ASEAN’s growth is distributed across different jurisdictions with varying demand profiles, reducing concentration risk for iron ore exporters and creating a more diversified customer base,” the media house said.

Iron ore miners have also highlighted sustained FDI functioning as a leading indicator for regional steel demand.

—IANS

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