Sidor, Venezuela's largest steelmaker, has some of its productive lines stopped due to the lack of raw materials, the Minister of Basic Industries Juan Arias said Thursday.
"In Sidor, some productive lines are not currently operating because the company is seeking for raw materials to be able to resume operations," said Arias Thursday.
Low international oil prices are the main reason Venezuela has been unable to import a large amount of raw materials for its basic industries, Arias said, with the steel industry severely affected due to its reliance on such imports.
Venezuela's main export product is oil and since the last quarter of 2014, its oil export prices decreased to well below $100/b, reaching a low of around $30/b in early 2016, he said.
Arias did not say which areas are offline at Sidor, but sources said that for finished steel products, longs operations were halted but flats operations were online.
Sidor's installed capacity is 425,000 mt/month, or 5.1 million mt/year, of crude steel. It can produce 2.8 million mt/year of hot-rolled coil, 1.7 million mt/year of cold-rolled coil, 390,000 mt/year of rebar and 600,000 mt/year of wire rod. The company also produces tubes and semi-finished products.
