Ukrainian steelworks produced 277,000 tonnes of steel in August 2026, which is 2.3 times less than in August last year, when output stood at 649,000 tonnes, according to Open4Business.
Compared with July this year, when 457,000 tonnes of steel were produced, the August figure fell by a further 39.4 per cent.
Against the backdrop of a sharp fall in production volumes, Ukraine has slipped to 33rd place amongst the 70 steel-producing countries for which data is collected by the World Steel Association (Worldsteel).
Back in July 2026, Ukraine was in 26th place, and in August 2025, it was in 21st place.
Thus, in just one year, the country has dropped 12 places in the monthly global ranking.
That said, the figures for the first eight months look better than those for August. Between January and August 2026, Ukraine produced 4.30 million tonnes of steel, which is 12.5 per cent less than the 4.91 million tonnes produced during the same period last year.
In terms of cumulative production over the eight months, Ukraine ranks 24th in the world.
By way of comparison: for the whole of 2025, Ukraine produced 7.41 million tonnes of steel, which was 2.2 per cent less than in 2024, and ranked 21st among global producers.
August thus proved to be one of the weakest months for the Ukrainian steel industry in 2026: production was 40 per cent lower than in July and less than half of last year’s level.
The decline in Ukraine is occurring much more rapidly than globally: in August, global steel production fell by only 1.2 per cent to 144.2 million tonnes, and for January–August by 0.7 per cent to 1.225 billion tonnes.