Iron ore is set to face a supply surplus from 2025/26

Significance Beijing seeks to reduce price volatility for ore and hence steel through market restructuring and to increase Chinese self-sufficiency. This comes at a time when ore exporters face firm demand but are struggling with a 50% rise in production costs since the pandemic. Impacts India, which plans to double its steel output by 2030, could rescue Australian producers facing shrinking opportunities in China. Russia’s shelling of Odesa port in Ukraine is making Black Sea iron ore shipments very unreliable. Large deposits of iron ore have been identified in India’s Rajasthan, with an estimated 840 million tons of ore. Rio Tinto, BHP and BlueScope Steel are jointly developing an electric smelting furnace to promote decarbonisation in steelmaking.