Crude steel production in Germany fell by 27 percent to 2.6 million tons in May compared to the same month last year, the German Steel Federation (WV Stahl) announced on Wednesday.

World crude steel production for the 64 countries reporting to the World Steel Association (worldsteel) was 148.8 million tonnes (Mt) in May 2020, an 8.7% decrease compared to May 2019.

China's imports of both semi-finished and finished steel products surged in April.

The output of crude steel, pig iron and steel in May were 92.27 million tons, 77.32 million tons and 114.53 million tons respectively.

In early June 2020, the key steel enterprises produced 21.0916 million tons of crude steel.

The last time output fell to a similar level was in June 2009, when the output was 2.60 million tonnes, WV Stahl added.

World crude steel production for the 64 countries reporting to the World Steel Association (worldsteel) was 137.1 million tonnes (Mt) in April 2020, a 13.0% decrease compared to April 2019.

In the week ending on May 16, 2020, domestic raw steel production was 1,181,000 net tons while the capability utilization rate was 52.7 percent.