Anti-dumping duty on Chinese silk imports

The Union government has imposed provisional anti-dumping duty pending final order on all imports of silk fabric from China to remove the "injury" to the Indian powerloom industry, a senior Central Silk Board official said on Wednesday.

"This is a provisional order passed on April 27, 2006, pending final order which will be imposed after a public hearing after 40 days. We are confident the final order will be in favour of the powerloom industry," Central Silk Board chief executive officer H Bhasker told reporters here.

The government has imposed provisional anti-dumping duties on imports of silk fabric weighing 20-100 grammes per metre, originating in or exported from China,considering the dumping margin which ranges from 57-115 per cent, depending on weight and variety of fabrics imported, he said.

The director general of antidumping and allied duties (ministry of commerce) has come out with a reference price of $2.09-6.15 per metre, a "non-injurious price of the domestic industry and any fabric of the above range imported from China below the reference price will attract anti-dumping duty," Bhasker said.

It was the 75,000 powerlooms, most of them in Karnataka, Varanasi and Surat, using silk yarn which were "badly hit from the large-scale dumping of silk fabrics from China".