India’s coking and PCI coal import shipments have totaled 18.08 million tonnes (mn t) in the first five months of the current fiscal (Apr-Aug’20) — down by almost 27% as against 24.76 mn t during the corresponding year-ago period.
Contrarily, however, the country’s coking and PCI coal imports have surged by as much as 48% month-on-month to 4.18 mn t in Aug’20, compared with 2.83 mn t in Jul’20.
Major coking coal exporters to India in Aug’20
Key Highlights
- Nearly three-fourths of the coking coal import shipments into India continued to be originated from Australia.
- India’s coking coal imports from Australia registered a 43% month-on-month growth in the last month of August.
- Inbound shipments of coking coal from Mozambique, US and Canada also grew by remarkable volumes contrasted with the previous month of July.
The following table presents a detailed country-wise break-up of the monthly import data.
Quantity in mn t
Russian coking coal imports fall short of expectations
- Indian intake of Russian coking coal exhibited a steep decline in August — contradicting the rising trend of coking coal imports from Russia seen over the past few months.
- This was presumably the effect of longstanding efforts towards reducing dependence on the handful of countries exporting the commodity to India.
- Notably, India and Russia have been engaged in talks to expand their energy partnership by increasing Russian crude oil imports into India.
- India reportedly signed a memorandum of understanding to import Russian-origin coking coal in order to meet requirements of domestic steel manufacturers.
Indian import of coking coal from Russia is well-poised to grow significantly in the coming months given that the Government of India has already stepped forward to establish economic linkages with Russia by extending a line of credit worth $1 billion in September last year.
Current Market Scenario & Near-term Outlook—
- The Indian market has been lately observing a considerable increase in enquiries for seaborne coking coal; however, spot transactions were barely heard other than existing long-term contracts.
- Although there has not been any significant improvement in steel product sales; production cuts have been largely withdrawn across much of the country’s steel manufacturing plants.
- Demand revival for spot purchases of seaborne coking coal by Indian steel mills will likely take a while and is anticipated to start showing signs of recovery after the monsoon season ends in late September at the earliest.
Traders anticipate that imported coking coal demand would pick up soon, as the country is gradually opening up and most steel plants have resumed normalized production operations.
~
By Aditya Sinha
Leave a Reply