In the event, which was opened by Namık Ekinci, Co-Chairman of the Board of Directors of Ekinciler Holding, and moderated by Mehmet Çakmur, Board Member of Kocaer Çelik, imports in the steel sector and the effects of imports on the sector were discussed.
Veysel Yayan, Secretary General of the Turkish Steel Producers Association, started his remarks by saying that we have never been in the mindset that imports would be good, "We always want domestic supply to be prioritized. We import from China. The domestic share of imports is 19.9%. We are currently at 48%. It has exceeded 50% from time to time. When Europe's exports fall to one-third of our exports, we are in a break-even situation. Even though Türkiye has the production capacity, they imported. We are using the resources of this country. Other countries do not allow this. The US applied it to China. China is not in a defensible situation. If China reaches 190 million, what would we gain from this? It would destroy our steel industry like a tsunami. Thinking in the medium term does not contribute to our economy and producers. They ignore that it will damage the steel industry. They took measures to protect the European Union from this situation. We are telling our ministers that we should take counter measures. They say that Europe will take countermeasures. There were words that the Turks are right. From understanding with everyone, this understanding has pushed the limits of your naivety.
While our imports increased from 9 million to 17 million tons, Europe's imports decreased from 10 million to 7 million tons. Europe is taking all kinds of measures to reduce imports. It is almost on par with ours. Our capacity utilization increased to 33 million tons. It is time to stop imports instead of looking for justification."
Yayan said, "Our capacity is 49 million tons, production is 35.9 million tons, utilization is 73.3% > There was a 13% capacity increase between 2012 and 2023, while production is declining." He said.
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