Slab output down, finished steel up

Brazil produced 512,000t of steel slabs in May, a drop of 17% compared to the same month in 2002, local steel association IBS reported. Slab output for first five months fell 15.7% year-on-year to 2.39Mt, it said. Output of rolled flat steel amounted to 1.12Mt in May, an increase of 18.2% compared to May 2002. And the January to May figure for the finished product was 5.3Mt, up 17.6% year-on-year. Long steel production expanded 5.7% to 669,000t in May and 7.2% to 3.2Mt in January-May, compared to the year-ago periods. As previously reported by BNamericas, Brazil's crude steel production reached 2.67Mt in May, or 9.1% more than in the same month of 2002. Crude steel output rose 8.7% to 12.7Mt in the first five months of this year versus the same period in 2002.