INTERVIEW-Assomet cuts Italy copper product output view

* Forecasts trimmed after weaker-than-expected H2 output * Full recovery will take a long time * Uncertainty with Alcoa's Italian units adds price tension By Svetlana Kovalyova MILAN, Dec 17 (Reuters) - Italy's copper and alloy semi-finished product industry will recover from the economic crisis more slowly than previously expected, a senior industry official said, while also trimming his earlier 2009 output forecast. "This year the output will be about 900,000-910,000 tonnes," Claudio De Cani, director of Italy's nonferrous metal association Assomet, told Reuters in a telephone interview on Thursday. In 2008, Italy produced 1.19 million tonnes of copper and alloy semi-finished products, which are used in construction and power generation industries, according to Assomet data. But the global economic crisis hit industrial demand for the red metal. "In 2010, there may be a slight recovery, to the levels just above 2009, I'd say to 920,000-930,000 tonnes," De Cani said. De Cani said he trimmed Assomet's earlier forecasts for 2009 and 2010 output, which were 923,600 tonnes and 968,300 tonnes respectively, after weaker-than-expected output in the second half of this year. Output of copper and alloy semi-finished products fell 25.8 percent year-on-year to 685,000 tonnes in the first nine months of this year, while aluminium semi-finished product output dropped 31.2 percent to 488,800 tonnes, Assomet data showed. LONG RECOVERY De Cani said the sector's full recovery to precrisis levels would take a long time and would largely depend on the pace of economic recovery after the recession. "Recovery will be a long process. For a couple of years, in 2010 and 2011, we'll continue to work at reduced capacity," he said, adding that Italian manufacturers of nonferrous metal semi-finished products use "just above" 50 percent of operating capacity at present. However, the sector has so far managed to avoid massive layoffs and only one company, which produced special alloy pipes for water and oil treatment industries, closed down, he said. Industrial consumers, which had practically cleared their inventories in the fist half of this year, have started rebuilding stocks, but new orders flow has been very uneven, De Cani said. "This stop-and-go of orders ... is not a sign of a steady pickup in (customer) activity," he said. Rolled copper and alloy products have so far been hit hardest among semi-finished products because of a decline in the construction industry, its main consumer, he said. Uncertainty about the future of Italian operations of the U.S. aluminium group Alcoa Inc has increased price tension on the market, De Cani said. In November, Alcoa said it would temporarily idle operations at its Italian smelters with a total capacity of 194,000 metric tonnes a year, after the European Commission ordered it to pay back most of the state aid it had received in Italy since 2006. De Cani said most of Alcoa's Italian smelters' output is used by the group's other Italian units. But concerns that other Italian manufacturers would get a new powerful competitor for imported metal if Alcoa closed its two Italian smelters have helped to wind up metals prices, he said. (Editing by Anthony Barker and Jim Marshall)