SAIL inventories marginally above norms

Ruling out any immediate cut in output in view of the waning demand, SAIL has said that its inventories are marginally above the norms but it sees the off-take improving soon. “In the past, the inventories used to be of 18-20 days, but now it has reached up to 35 days. I consider 30 days' inventory to be normal, which means we are operating slightly above the ideal limits,” SAIL Chairman Mr S K Roongta said. In the last one month, the steel major's stockpiles of inventories have touched close to a million tonnes due to a steep fall in demand from consuming sectors like real estate and automobile, which are facing the heat of credit crunch. The SAIL Chairman, however, saw the Indian steel industry bouncing back soon with good demand for the commodity. “We are not going to be back to the pre-September levels so soon. But the prevailing negative sentiments in the world will improve,” he said. Mr Roongta said the domestic industry ought to thrive if cheap and unfair imports are checked by the government. “Seven million tonnes of steel import in the last fiscal is not less. If unfair imports are checked, companies would be able to sell off a si zable amount in the domestic market,” he said.To a question on whether SAIL was mulling production cut, Mr Roongta said there was no immediate plan for it, but the company was constantly reviewing the market demand as also its inventories.“Let us see how market conditions are. There are different growth projections varying from 7 to 8 per cent. Even at this growth rate, I don't see any need to cut production. However, more important is that any unfair imports should not happen at this mom ent.”