EU to Investigate Alleged Chinese and Taiwanese Stainless Steel Imports

Author: Paul Ploumis17 Jun 2014 Last updated at 09:19:50 GMT

LONDON (Scrap Monster): By the end of this month, the European Commission will begin an investigation regarding the alleged dumping of stainless steel into the European Union by producers from China and Taiwan, a main executive said.

The stainless steel manufacturers in China are increasing the output, despite a slow domestic growth. Wolfgang Eder, chief executive of Austrian steelmaker Voestalpine, said that these trade cases CR stainless from China and Taiwan had been brought up to the commission and to his knowledge the commission had agreed to file them.

He added that they were expecting more anti dumping regulation in the second half and could confirm that the imports into Europe were going up rapidly. The commission has 45 days to determine they proceed or not proceed with the investigation. The EU commission can force provisional duties within the period of nine months of starting an investigation if it found that the imports are dumped.

After a further 6 months, commission members can agree to impose definitive fines, which typically last for five years. The commission will also investigate case about unfair subsidies, those lasting 13 months. According to Eurostat, the total imports of CR stainless steel sheet from Taiwan and China was about 758 million Euros last year, which is 10 fold greater than from that of 2002. Production in European Union in 2012 was around 23.6 billion Euros.

One steelmaker of Taiwan said that they had been expecting the anti dumping investigation since last year and its impact on them would be high. European zone is the largest export market for cold rolled stainless of Taiwan, which accounts for around 25 percent of net exports. EU has already imposed duties on seven kinds of steel products from China, which includes stainless fasteners and welded tubes.

The China Iron and Steel Association have warned already that the increasing steel exports from China were probably to raise the anti-dumping action risks all around the world. The United States has made probe regarding the carbon and alloy steel wire imports from China and they confirmed the plans to impose duties on Chinese and Mexican concrete steel rail tie wire. The US also subsidized high tech steel unfairly.

Chinese steel and stainless steel exports reached 8.07 million tonnes in May and this is the ever highest level and an annual raise of 41.5 percent. According to Steel Market Intelligence GmbH. China has produced above half of the stainless steel in the world last year, even though there was a weak pricing trends and demand.