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Icra in its latest report has said that it revised its outlook for domestic steel demand to 7-8 per cent for the next fiscal. Earlier, it had estimated the demand to grow in the range of 6-7 per cent. It mentioned with the central government's capex outlay in FY2024, Icra has revised upwards its steel consumption growth estimate for FY24 to 7-8 per cent. In 2023-24, the capital expenditure is budgeted at Rs 10 lakh crore which will constitute 3.3 per cent of GDP.

In the ongoing fiscal also, the domestic steel consumption growth has remained strong supported by the government's push for infrastructure-led economic growth. The consumption of finished steel in India was 107.20 million tonne during April-February of FY23.

Jayanta Roy, Senior Vice-President & Group Head - Corporate Sector Ratings at ICRA, said ‘With steel consumption expected to grow in high-single digits next year, we expect the industry's capacity utilisation rate to improve to around 80 per cent in FY2024, despite the commissioning of some new expansion projects.’