Caglayan: "Turkey could save $2.5 bln by boosting demostic scrap use"

Turkey could save about $2.5 billion by reducing imports of scrap iron and steel by 5 million tons per year, Foreign Trade Minister Zafer Caglayan said yesterday. Caglayan made the remarks during a briefing on input supply strategy co-organized by the Turkish Union of Chambers and Commodities Exchanges (TOBB), Turkish Industrialists and Businessmen's Association (TUSIAD), Turkish Exporters Assembly (TIM), Turkish Confederation of Businessmen and Industrialists (TUSKON), and other groups. Caglayan said Turkey had managed to boost its total share of world steel production from 1.7 percent to 2.1 percent, adding that it currently is the world's 10th-largest steel producer. He added that by 2015 Turkey's scrap iron and steel needs will rise from 23 million tons to 34 million tons, saying Turkey must carefully examine its rising scrap dependence. "We need to improve domestic scrap iron and steel resources," he said. "This is very important since Turkey uses only 5 million tons of domestic scrap and imports the remainder. If we can add another 5 million tons of domestic scrap to the iron and steel sector, we can prevent the transfer of $2.5 billion to foreign countries." He added, "My ministry has sent notices to the governors of Turkey's 81 provinces to devise an action plan for raising the scrap iron and steel supply. I hope we will be able to keep the $2.5 billion within Turkey and reduce our dependence on imports."