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| European steel makers cry foul over safeguard duty |
| Nevin John / Mumbai Apr 30, 2009, 00:09 IST |
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European steel makers have protested India’s move to safeguard the domestic steel market through anti-dumping duties even after endorsing the country’s commitments to avoid protectionism at the recent G-20 summit.
The European Union Steel Producers’ Federation (Eurofer) has criticised India for its plan to impose safeguard duty on hot rolled (HR) steel imports on top of an anti-dumping investigation, which is already underway. The federation fears that this move of the Indian government would encourage other countries to impose similar duties to restrict imports.
The India government has decided to take action against dumping, mainly to protect the domestic steel making industry. According to government sources, the commerce ministry is looking to impose around 20 per cent safeguard duty on hot rolled (HR) coil import, which surged three-fold in the last six months.
In addition to it, the ministry is investigating imports from China, Indonesia, Iran, Japan, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, the Philippines, Romania, Russia, South Africa, Saudi Arabia, Korea, Thailand, Turkey and Ukraine for imposing anti-dumping duty. Indian imports of HR flat products amount to some 2 million tonne a year, of which 500,000 tonne a year are from the EU.
“Following the Washington meeting in November last year, the G20 members did not lose time in raising steel import barriers. Now, shortly after the London meeting this month, we see India, a key G20 member, opening a steel safeguard investigation on the import of hot-rolled flat steel products on top of an already ongoing anti-dumping procedure for the same products,” Eurofer director general Gordon Moffat reportedly said.
Discarding the opposition from European steel makers, the government had imposed anti-dumping duty on stainless steel products a few days back. The punitive taxes are being levied until October 21 on imports from China, Japan, Korea, the European Union, South Africa, Taiwan, Thailand and the US. India produces about 1.8 million tonne of stainless steel annually, two-thirds of which is consumed locally.
HR coil import to India was 0.80 lakh tonne a month during July-September 2008. When the downturn tightened its grip, the imports started spurting and reached 1.5 lakh tonne a month during the quarter ended-December. It has further surged to over 2.3 lakh tonne a month during January-February 2009.
Along with the rise in imports, the price of imported HR coil has declined drastically. The landed price fell to below $400 a tonne last month from over $1,000 in October ’08. Imports currently attract 5 per cent customs duty besides sundry expenses such as port handling charges and logistic costs. Even after all the sundry expenses, the imported steel is cheaper compared to the domestic steel.
Currently, the domestic HR coil price is Rs 25,000- 26,000 (approximately $500 to $520) a tonne in the country.
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