Azerbaijan, Baku, September 23 /Trend N. Umid/
Iran's East Azerbaijan Province shares some 20 per cent of the country's steel production, deputy Director of East Azerbaijan Province's Industrial Parks Organisation, Ibrahim Mohammadi said, the Iranian Ettelaat newspaper reported.
He went on to note that about 20 steel production units are active in the province.
Iran ranks 15th in the world in terms of steel production he said, adding that some 128 steel production units produce up to 13 million tons of steel annually in the country.
According to the report, East Azerbaijan's Bonab Steel Industry Complex's annual steel production capacity reaches some 2.400 million tons, including 1.800 million tons of building armatures.
Iran produced 1.292 million tons of crude steel in August 2013, the World Steel Association said in its latest press release.
The figure shows more than a 13 per cent increase compared to the same month of the previous year. The country's total output in the first half of the 2013 amounted to 9.955 million tons.
Iran's crude steel production reached 14.89 million tons in the previous Iranian calendar year ended on March 20.
Iran plans to increase its annual steel output to 55 million tons by the end of the Fifth Five-Year Development Plan (2015).