"U.S. Steel" to stop primary production in Smederevo’s forge on April 3rd?

Fire in high furnace II in forge "U.S. Steel Srbija" in Smederevo will be put out on Friday, April 3rd. In that way, primary production in the forge will be completely discontinued.

The first furnace works at low steam for six months now because of the drop in demand in the steel market. Smederevo-based Forge is receiving almost no orders from the buyers at all. In accord with the market requests, the delivery of ores, coke and other raw materials has been stopped. The materials that have already been delivered will be used within the next few days, if needed.

The company has not officially confirmed that fire in the second furnace will be put out, although the management announced that possibility at the end of the last year.

- For the time being, the second furnace works at usual regime, and we are going to adapt to the needs of the buyers and to the situation in the global steel market in the following period. I can not give any prognoses about when and whether it is going to be turned off - Nemanja Brković, the Manager of Communications, said for “Novosti”.

Although the trade unions and the management can not tell for how long the crisis will last, some of them claim that the production in the forge will last until the end of the year, at the latest.

Hot and cold rolling mill will be processing semi-finished products that will be delivered from Slovakia, from the stocks of "U.S. Steel" in Košice.