Jamshedpur, Sept 15: A day after government imposed 20 percent provisional safeguard duty on specific steel products for a period of 200 days to help the domestic steel industry from low priced imports from China, Japan and Korea, TV Narendran, MD Tata Steel said the safeguard duty should help in curbing predatory pricing and surging imports which has seen an increase of about sixty percent over the corresponding period of last year.�
“Government of India has recognized the issues being faced by the domestic steel industry arising out of dumping of steel from countries having surplus steel capacities.�
India is an ideal location to have Steel Industry to grow as it has the required raw material resources and the markets to consume steel and the Indian Steel Industry has been the largest investors in manufacturing in the Indian Economy in the last ten years by spending on expanding steel capacities and bringing state of the art technologies.�
This�also supports the “Make in India” campaign of Government of India. As per the report released by World steel Dynamics on the most competitive steel plants , 6 out of top 32 steel plants are from India, hence�Steel industry needs to be nurtured by improving factor costs like logistics costs, regulatory costs and cost �of capital.�
India should assess the pros and cons of bilateral and multilateral trade agreements to achieve its stated objectives including strengthening domestic industries�, Narendran added.
A�government-appointed panel on Monday�gave nod to 20 percent provisional safeguard duty on specific steel products for a period of 200 days. The move will help the domestic steel industry from low-priced imports from China, Japan and Korea.
The decision of the panel, comprising of the commerce, steel and revenue secretaries,�comes after the�Directorate General (DG) of Safeguards recommended�the duty�on September 9. The import duty on flat steel products will be at 12.5 percent and on long products, it will be 10 percent.�
Safeguard duty will be the latest imports of specific steel products from China, Japan and Korea for 200 days.