The rapidly growing infrastructural development and a robust domestic demand has helped the
Indian steel sector to progress by leaps and bounds in the last few years. According to an estimate by the Planning Commission of India, incremental demand for steel over the next 5 years will be about 40 million tonnes in the infrastructure sector solely. As far as the overall domestic demand growth is concerned, World Steel Association predicts it to be at about 5.9 per cent in 2013 and scaling upto 7 per cent by 2014. This opens large doors of opportunity for the industry.
The success story of Indian steel industry is backed by all round excellent performance in terms of growth parameters and meeting fast and varying customer requirements in automobile, construction, capital goods and consumer durable segments. The industry has been receiving all the essential ingredients required for dynamic growth. If there are no major deviations, India may well be world's second largest steel producer by 2015-16, as compared to its present 4th rank, according to a E&Y report.
In the recent years, as most global steel giants have cut down their production and shut down their plants due to a lacklusture demand, India has been a favoured destination to them due to a strong and sustained demand. In the last 5 years, the FDI investment in the sector has jumped up at about 40 per cent CAGR. This figure is an open testimony of how bullish foreign players are about the India story.
Sminu Jindal, Managing Director, Jindal Saw
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