ZAPORIZHZHIA, Ukraine — In this eastern Ukrainian city, a Soviet-era mural stands boldly in front of Zaporizhstal iron and steel works.

The mural shows muscular ironworkers handing a freshly forged sword to equally muscular soldiers who are rushing off to war. Today, however, Ukraine's iron industry is in rough shape because of war itself.

During much of the 20th century, a thriving industrial heartland churned in central and eastern Ukraine, fed by abundant coal mines and big, hulking steel mills. In several parts of the country, these plants still dominate the landscape, the local economy and even civic identity. Iron and steel production remains Ukraine's second-leading industry after agriculture. And prior to the Russian invasion this year, it was a major supplier of iron ore to Turkey, China and parts of the European Union.

While the war with Russia has raised serious international concern about getting Ukraine's vast production of wheat, corn and sunflower oil — normally its top exports — to global markets, the invasion has been even more devastating to the country's metalworks. Exports of bulk iron ore, for instance, that are shipped by the ton in massive cargo vessels have stopped entirely from Ukrainian ports.

Sponsor Message

Just half of the plant's blast furnaces are on

Inside the sprawling Zaporizhstal industrial compound, the plant's giant blast furnaces normally convert tons of raw iron ore into a stream of molten orange pig iron.

But Serhiy Safonov, the manager of the blast furnace shop, says that only two of the factory's four blast furnaces are currently operational.

Employees secure and package rolls of sheet steel at the Zaporizhstal PJSC rolled steel plant in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine, on June 30.

Julia Kravchenko/Bloomberg via Getty Images

The furnaces are designed to run constantly, he says, and normally would never be shut down over their 30-year life span. But earlier this year all four furnaces had to be dialed back to what Safonov calls a "low idle" as Russian troops threatened to advance on Zaporizhzhia. Moscow's forces never reached the area, but tens of thousands of people fled. Much of the city shut down, and the factory that used to employ 11,000 workers is now operating at less than 50% of capacity.

Yuriy Ryzhenkov, the CEO of Metinvest Group, which owns the Zaporizhstal plant, says they have enough raw materials inside Ukraine to keep pumping out rolls of sheet metal and bars of cast iron. The problem is they can't get those products to market. Metinvest and other Ukrainian steel producers now have huge backlogs of processed metal sitting in Ukrainian warehouses.

"The main difficulty is the logistics," Ryzhenkov says. Traditionally, all Ukrainian steel companies, of which Metinvest is the largest, export their products via the Black Sea ports or Azov Sea ports. "At the moment," Ryzhenkov says. "The ports have been blocked by the Russians."

There's no deal for shipping steel