Sometimes the state plays disciplinarian. Only in the past few months two anti-trust investigations have been launched into steelmakers and miners, looking to establish whether they have abused their dominant position in the domestic market.

And Vladimir Putin’s admonishment of Mechel chairman Igor Zyuzin when he failed to make a meeting with the pm in 2008 must have been very hard to forget.

But, a lot of the time, the government offers its help.

The financial support state-controlled organisations such as Vnesheconombank (VEB) and Sberbank gave steelmakers during the economic crisis of 2007 and 2008 is just one example.

Now Russia’s steel oligarchs need the administration to play a key role in the sector’s next stage of development.

Speaking at MB’s recent Russian Steel Summit, TMK chairman Dmitry Pumpyansky called for limitations to be placed on exports of ferrous scrap.

Russian steelmakers are largely integrated. While most have captive raw materials to feed their blast furnaces, smaller EAF-based steel mills will be more flexible and will be an important part of the industry’s next stage of growth, he said.

But this isn’t the only way the steel sector needs to evolve.

This week, steelmakers in the Chelyabinsk region will meet with the region’s governor Mikhail Yurevich and Putin.

Speaking two weeks ago, at the commissioning of the company’s new slitting line, Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel (MMK) chairman of the board Viktor Rashnikov said the mills would lobby for a three-year tax holiday on imports of steelmaking equipment.

If granted, this will help them shop around for the best steelmaking tools and put them on the path towards developing a base of high-quality steelmaking in Russia. This is something the industry really needs.

Russian producers can’t just keep pumping out commodity-grade steel for the rest of the world. They need to develop a more advanced market for their output at home as well.

But technology isn’t their only issue.

At the same meeting, Chelyabinsk’s steelmakers will ask the government to shorten the time it takes to refund VAT on material they ship overseas. At the moment it takes 90 days.

Reducing this period to 30 days might sound like a tall order. But government efforts to shorten this time would prove a serious boon for the industry.

MMK exports 35% of its total production, and pays 18% VAT on every tonne of steel it ships overseas. That leaves a lot of money stuck in the system, money that steelmakers could use to advance their facilities.

If the government sees sense and does its best to free up these funds, then the path to a more sustainable Russian steel industry will be a lot easier to tread.