Japan's Daiki Aluminium to produce about 500,000 mt in 2007

Japan's Daiki Aluminium is expected to produce about 500,000 mt of secondary aluminium from its combined operations in Japan, Thailand, Malaysia and the United States, the company's executive officer general manager of the purchasing department, Shigenori Hayashi, told Platts at the sidelines of China's 1st Secondary Aluminium Industry Conference in Beijing over the weekend.

"We will produce about 500,000 mt of secondary aluminium alloy ingot in 2007, which is about 6% higher compared with output last year," he said.

The company has an overall capacity for about 530,000 mt/year of secondary aluminium alloy ingot.

Hayashi added that Japan is expected to see stable imports of ADC12.1 and other aluminium alloys in 2007, which "would be about the same as last year...people are not importing as much because the Japanese yen has weakened."

In 2006, Japan imported about 338,000 mt of aluminium alloys including ADC12.1, up from 228,000 mt imported in 2005, Hayashi said during his presentation at the conference.

Japan imports mainly from China, Russia, Taiwan, and South Korea.