Steel imports tariff of 31% suggested across Gulf

The tariff is targeted at cheap products, with China among the offenders.

Arabian Gulf governments are proposing slapping a 31 per cent safeguard tariff on some steel imports to help protect an industry battered by cheap products, particularly from China.

According to a filing with the World Trade Organization published yesterday, the proposal from the GCC includes introducing the tariffs on flat-rolled products of iron or non-alloy steel for a three-year period, with the rate falling to 28 per cent in the second year and 25 per cent in third year.

“The date of introduction of the measure will be determined in the TSAIP (GCC-Bureau of Technical Secretariat for Anti-Injurious Practices in International Trade) Official Gazette which will be published once the Ministerial Committee approves the imposition of the measure,” the filing said.

“GCC-TSAIP found that there is sufficient evidence to the existence of the causal link between serious injury caused to the GCC industry and the increase of imports of the product under investigation.”

Between 2012 and 2015, imported volumes of the products referred to above into the Gulf region more than doubled from 193,552 tonnes to 405,809 tonnes, the filing said.

The WTO filing mentioned a number of “unforeseen events” that have affected the Gulf steel industry. These include increased production,especially from China, economic recession in China that led countries to switch exports to other markets such as the Gulf, and the depreciation of some currencies to record lows against the US dollar – to which most Gulf currencies are pegged.

China, the world’s biggest steel producer, accounted for nearly half of the world’s output last year, up from just 15 per cent in 2000, according to figures from the World Steel Association. Excess production from the Chinese market has been blamed for depressed steel prices in recent years.

Producers in the UAE have also been hit with anti-dumping tariffs in recent months. In Nov­ember, the United States International Trade Commission imposed charges on certain types of circular welded steel pipe that it said had been sold below market price. At the time, Abdulla Al Saleh, the UAE’s undersecretary for Foreign Trade and Industry, said that it would challenge the decision and that it may take its case to the WTO if its appeal went unheard.

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