Japan ferrous scrap exports down 1.7% in April: MoF

By Paul Ploumis 16 Jun 2015 Last updated at 04:07:33 GMT

TOKYO (Scrap Monster): The trade statistics released by the Japanese Ministry of Finance (MoF) indicates that the country’s ferrous scrap exports totaled 745,819 tons in April this year. This is 1.7% lower when compared with the exports during the same month a year ago. The cumulative ferrous scrap exports by the country during first four months of the year totaled 2.672 million tons, up 18.2% when compared with the exports of 2.260 million tons during January to April in 2014.

Among ports, Chiba ranked first, exporting 138,969 tons during the month. This accounted for 19% of the total exports from Japan during the month. The other major ports that accounted for ferrous scrap exports from the country were: Kawasaki (88,712 tons), Tokyo (62,218 tons), Nagoya (44,384 tons) and Tobata (27,242 tons).

Also, Chiba accounted for 15% of the total ferrous scrap exports by the country during the four-month period from January to April this year. The exports through the port totaled 402,055 tons, 26.1% higher when compared with the exports of 318,821 tons during Jan-Apr ’14. In second place was Kawasaki with total exports of 334,392 tons, with 12.5% share. The exports through the port surged higher by 16.7% when matched with the exports of 286,559 tons during the corresponding four-month period in 2014. In third place was Tokyo with 169,949 tons.

The other major customs ports which accounted for ferrous scrap shipments out of Japan during January to April this year were: Kinnura (133,227 tons, 5% share), Nagoya (132,942 tons, 5% share), Tobata (122,896 tons, 4.6% share) and Toyohashi (111,821 tons, 4.2% share).