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We are starting to see the impacts of the US-Iran war on aluminium production figures. Production in the Gulf countries fell by 6% in March to an average of 15,963 tonnes per day, down from 16,997 tonnes per day in February. We do not yet have final March figures for all our members’ smelters at this point and we can expect the actual output to be lower still when the full dataset becomes available in May. The war is having an obvious impact on the market, with the publicly quoted LME price now at a four-year high.
Most smelters would have been drawing down their stocks of raw materials as the closure of the Strait of Hormuz cut off supplies of bauxite and alumina. Three of our members have announced cuts in their production following attacks on their smelters or energy infrastructure. So, we can expect the impacts of the war on aluminium production to continue to get worse.
Even after an orderly shutdown, restarting a potline can take weeks or months, so supply chains may need many months to normalise. For facilities that sustained damage, recovery will take longer still.
The Gulf’s aluminium sector produced around 6.5 million tonnes in 2025 or 9% of global capacity. However, it represents around 15% of imports into the EU and 20% into the US.
Reopening the Strait is essential to allow producers to restock raw materials and export finished products that have been largely stranded at smelters. This is now having a knock-on impact on supply-chains extending as far as Australia which supplies alumina to some of the Gulf smelters.
– IAI Secretary General, Jonathan Grant
March’s Global Primary Aluminium data shows that
- Global primary aluminium production is estimated to be 6,302 at a daily rate of 203.3.
- Production daily average decreased 0.29% compared to February.
- Estimated Chinese production was 3,795 (kt)
- Africa production was 130 (kt)
- North American production was 334 (kt)
- South American production was 132 (kt)
- Asia (ex China) production was 421 (kt)
- Europe (inc Russia) production was 622 (kt)
- Oceania production was 159 (kt)
- GCC (Gulf) production was 495 (kt)
Overall, primary aluminium production in March increased by 0.94% year-on-year.
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