Troubled by the rising imports, China has today announced the imposition of anti-dumping duties on stainless steel products being imported from countries including Japan, South Korea, European Union and Indonesia. These products include stainless steel billets and hot-rolled stainless steel plates.
Stainless steel billets and hot-rolled stainless steel plates can be processed into cold-rolled steel products or directly used in shipbuilding, shipping containers, railway equipment, power generation equipment, and petrochemicals.
The duty rates of 18.1% to 103.1% will be applied to stainless steel billets and hot-rolled stainless steel plates from companies in the EU and the three Asian nations, effective July 23, China’s Ministry of Commerce said in a statement.
Last year, a complaint was filed by state owned Shanxi Taigang Stainless Steel claiming rising influx of cheap imports causing damage to China’s domestic stainless steel sector resulting which an anti-dumping probe was initiated in July last year. The investigation agency has now made a final decision that there was dumping of the investigated products and it has caused substantive damage to the industry in China.
How much stainless steel enters China?
According to China’s Stainless Steel Association, the world’s largest stainless steel producer, churned out 26.71 MnT of stainless steel products in 2018, up 2.4% from a year ago and the country imported 1.85 million tonnes of stainless steel products last year, up 53.7% from 2017. China imports significant amounts of stainless steel billets and hot-rolled stainless steel plates from Indonesia, while there are currently few imports from the European Union, Japan, or South Korea. In the first five months of 2019 (Jan-May) Indonesia remained the largest stainless steel exporter to China with 284,800 tonnes being exported to the country followed by South Korea and Japan.
With restrictions in place, the imports from South Korea will be the hardest hit with all manufacturers, apart from POSCO, subject to an increased duty of 103.1% duty. POSCO shipments will be subject to a duty of only 23.1%. Manufacturers from all 28 European Union countries will be subject to a 43% tariff, while Japanese imports will be subject to 29% duty, except those form Nippon Yankin Kogyo, which will only attract 18.1% duty.
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