World crude steel production for March increased by a marginal 1% year-on-year to 135-million tonnes, the World Steel Association (worldsteel) reported on Monday.

China posted improved production for March of 66.3-million tonnes, up 6.6% on the first quarter of 2012, while Japan produced 9.4-million tonnes of crude steel, up 1.3% compared with the same month last year.

South Korea’s crude steel production for March was 5.7-million tonnes, down 7% over March 2012.

Meanwhile, Asia produced 259.8-million tonnes of crude steel in the first three months of this year – an increase of 6.4% over the first quarter of 2012.

Global output for the first quarter of this year amounted to 388.8-million tonnes, 2.3% higher than the 380.06-million tonnes produced in the first quarter of 2012.

Output from the European Union contracted by 5.4% to 41.5-million tonnes of crude steel for the first quarter, while North America’s crude steel production for the three months also decreased by 5.7% year-on-year to 29.7-million tonnes.

Germany produced 3.8-million tonnes of crude steel in March 2013, a decrease of 2.2% on March 2012, while Italy’s crude steel production dived by 18.4% to 2.2-million tonnes.

Spain’s production of 1.3-million tonnes was 2.3% lower than that of March 2012, while France’s output decreased more dramatically, contracting by 9.6% to 1.3-million tonnes for the month.

Turkey’s crude steel production for March was three-million tonnes, down 4.6% compared with March 2012.

The US’ March production, meanwhile, dropped 8.4% to 7.3-million tonnes, while Brazil’s output decreased by 7.6% to 2.9-million tonnes compared with the same month last year.

Russia produced six-million tonnes of crude steel, a decrease of 2.8% compared with the same month last year and Ukraine’s crude steel production for March 2013 was 2.9-million tonnes, 2.9% less than March 2012.

Meanwhile, the crude steel capacity utilisation ratio for the 63 countries reporting to worldsteel in March 2013 slid to 79.4% from 80.5% in February 2013, and was 2.1 percentage points lower than that of March 2012.