Myanmar spends over US$1 bln on iron and steel imports every year

About 2 million tonnes of iron and steel are yearly imported into the country so there is an outflow of funds worth more than US$1 billion every year, Union Minister Dr Charlie Than of the Ministry of Industry.
He gave a remark at the workshop held on 2 February regarding iron ore mining sites in Myanmar and iron and steel manufacturing processes that Myanmar has a requirement of about 2.5 million tonnes of iron and steel consumption per year. The domestic production is estimated at 1 million tonnes. Therefore, about 2 million tonnes are brought into the country. Myanmar is rich in minerals so it needs to ramp up production to meet the self-sufficiency of iron and steel. This way, the production technology will be improved, he added.
Myanmar’s iron and steel production businesses are way behind in technology and cannot keep up with the neighbouring countries. The policies of iron and steel are required to appraise the quality of imported iron and steel and locally produced ones. The Union minister said that policies will be laid down, in cooperation with the experts, to come up with effective and appropriate methods regarding the extraction of iron from iron ore, mining sites, availability of related minerals, energy and fuel support.
There is one state-owned iron and steel factory under the Ministry of Defence, two under the Ministry of Industry and three under the Myanmar Economic Corporation and there are privately owned 362 iron smelting workshops registered with the Department of Industrial Supervision and Inspection. — TWA/EM