The Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development (MOHURD) has issued a document to encourage the development of steel structural housing, which serves the target of promoting  prefabricated buildings during the 13th Five-Year Plan period on the one hand, and eases the pressure of steel overcapacity on the other hand. The number of orders for steel structure producers is expected to further increase, injecting vitality into the market.

Huge Development Space for China’s Steel Structure Industry

The Transformation and Upgrade Plan for the Iron and Steel Industry (2016-2020) clearly states: “Efforts shall be made to accelerate the promotion and application of steel structural buildings, encourage steel companies to actively participate in the construction of steel structure demonstration bases, and to develop customized and personalized steel products that meet the needs on steel structural building components, promote the application of high-strength steel for steel structures withstanding 390 MPa and above, carry out R&D of fire-resistant and anti-corrosive steel and other high-performance steel for steel structures, explore on the production of highly standardized steel structure components, establish unified distribution centers for steel structure components, and strive to increase the usage of steel structures from the current 50 million tons to more than 100 million tons. ”

Policies on Prefabricated Steel Structures Breaking New Grounds

On March 27, 2019, the official website of the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development issued the “Notice of the Construction Market Supervision Department of the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development on Printing and Distributing the Key Points of the Work in 2019”, proposing major reform in key areas of the construction industry to promote the transformation and upgrading of the industry. The Notice proposed to pilot the construction of prefabricated steel structural housings with clear goals, specific tasks and supportive measures, aiming to steadily advance the pilot work. In order to implement pilot projects, a certain percentage of projects out of government-subsidized housing, prefabricated housing, dilapidated rural house renovation and impoverished resident relocation is designated to adopt prefabricated steel structures in pilot areas. The progress of pilot projects shall be put under close observation and relevant policies shall be improved to facilitate the establishment of a full-fledged system in favor of construction of prefabricated steel structural housing.

Expected Rapid Growing Period for Prefabricated Steel Structural Buildings

Subject to the impact of China’s macroeconomic decline and overcapacity cutting policies in the past two years, the national economy and the steel structure industry have experienced significant downturn. Nonetheless, China’s steel structure industry index rose 34.26% at the beginning of 2019, outperforming the national economy by 6.62pct, and the steel structure industry rebounded strongly. As more favorable policies are to come into effect, China’s prefabricated buildings market is expected to usher in a period of rapid development. Among them, prefabricated steel structural buildings are worth more attention. Since the prefabricated building industry is not highly concentrated at present, it is more likely for the leading companies in the industry to pick up a growth speed faster than the average industry growth rate.