South Korean steel company Dongkuk Steel Mill Co. will shut down its plant in Incheon, Gyeonggi Province for the first time since its inception.

The shutdown comes as prices of construction materials, încluding rebar, plummeted due to the prolonged slump in the construction industry.

Dongkuk Steel said on Monday that it decided to suspend all operations at its Incheon plant for around a month during a board meeting held that day.

The shutdown will last for 25 days, from July 22nd, 2025 to August 15th.

“If the oversupply issue does not improve, we will consider extending the shutdown period,” a company official said.

The Incheon plant is a key production base that accounts for about 40 percent of the company’s annual revenue.

Its main product is rebar, with an annual production capacity of 2.2 million tons which makes it the largest single plant of its kind in Korea.

Industry observers note that the current construction downturn is more severe than during the 2008 global financial crisis.

Concerns are growing that recovery will be difficult unless the industry undergoes a fundamental transformation, given that the downturn is structurally complex.

According to the Construction & Economy Research Institute of Korea (CERIK), construction orders - a leading indicator of the construction economy - fell by 16.6 percent year-on-year in 2023, a sharper decline than the 6.1 percent drop seen during the 2008 crisis.

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