Minerals and Metals industry is a critical sector driving growth of the Indian economy. As per expert’s estimates, for every 1 percent increase in mining and quarrying activities, industrial production increases by 1.2-1.4 percent. Correspondingly, GDP growth increases by 0.3-0.4 percent. Steel is one of the most important metals in the auto components and construction industries. Rapid growth in various sectors like defence, oil and gas, railways, power, infrastructure, automotive, capital goods etc is likely to drive the demand further for steel. Moreover rural India is mostly unexploited from the demand point of view, thus providing a huge potential waiting to be explored. However there are various constraints like increasing dominance of global players, raw material issues, financing issues, environmental issues and others.

Domestic steel companies are expected to report subdued numbers in Q3FY16 due to 5-8 percent sequential decline in steel prices on the back of sharp fall in prices, weak demand and increased pressure from cheap imports largely from China and CIS countries, which resulted in price cuts during the quarter. While the Government has implemented a 20 percent safeguard duty on steel for a period of 200 days in September last year, global prices continued their downward trend during the quarter.

Further, while raw material prices have also corrected, the positive impact of the same comes with a lag. This coupled with weak domestic demand is expected to weigh on the performance of ferrous companies. While it welcomed the move to remove basic customs duty on nickel in the Union Budget but a major part of the stainless steel industry's demand for nickel is met from Ferro nickel and stainless steel scrap. Basic Customs Duty on finished products has not been increased in spite of continued surge in import of stainless steel products into the country. While the Chamber welcomed the move to remove basic customs duty on nickel it pointed out that a major part of the stainless steel industry's demand for nickel is met from Ferro nickel and stainless steel scrap. Both ferro nickel and stainless scrap, key raw materials for stainless steel manufacturing, attract an import duty of 2.5%.

In this context The Bengal Chamber of Commerce and Industry organized the fifth “Metals” Summit on 18th February 2017 at Taj Bengal, Kolkata.

The Opening Session of the Summit was addressed by Guest of Honour Shri T V Narendran, MD, Tata Steel India & South East Asia. He spoke about, “Vision 2020: Demand of Steel in Auto components & Constructions from a Global Player’s perspective. Shri Malay Chatterjee, Chairman & MD, KIOCL Ltd. also joined as Guest of Honour at the Opening Session and he shared his experience from the PSU perspective.

Shri Subrata Mitra, Joint MD, M N Dastur & Co.(P) Ltd.; Shri Somnath Guha, Managing Director, Metalist Consultants Pvt. Ltd. and Shri Sushim Banerjee, Director General, INSDAG addressed on “Growth of Steel and Steel Processing Industries in the East”.

Shri P K Mishra, ED- Marketing, Flat Products, Steel Authority of India Ltd. and Shri Tapas Basu, General Manager – Corporate Planning, MSTC Limited spoke in the Session on “ Demand for Indian Iron & Steel Industry: Overview & Road Ahead from PSU’s Perspective”.

The Summit also witnessed the participation of a large and relevant audience from the metallurgical industry and eminent industry players and was widely covered in the media.