What is the current and future scenario in the Indian iron and steel industry?
Emerging economies like India are on the road to recovery which is a positive sign for steel industry. Infrastructure activities have picked up with lots of projects that were on hold now restarting. The automobile industry is also showing good volume growth which is supporting demand. World Steel Association has estimated that the domestic steel consumption in FY10 will grow at around 6.5 per cent. However, we feel that growth can be higher keeping in view that second half will be much better than many analysts feel. With strong demand prices are also firming up and we believe that it will continue its upward trend in the next few quarters. The outlook in the long term also looks very promising for the industry. While the demand for steel will continue to grow in traditional sectors such as infrastructure, construction, housing, automotive, steel tubes and pipes, consumer durables, packaging, and ground transportation, specialised steel will be increasingly used in hitech engineering
