Steel pipes: Canada slaps anti-dumping duty on Pakistan’s product

KARACHI: Canada has imposed anti-dumping duties on the import of circular welded steel pipe (CWSP) from four countries including Pakistan, the Philippines, Turkey and Vietnam in the range of 3% to 95%.

The Canadian Border Services Agency (CBSA) and the Canadian International Trade Tribunal (CITT) commenced a preliminary injury and dumping inquiry into CWSP imports from the above four countries.

Last month, the CBSA announced its preliminary determination on dumping margins on CWSP imports from Pakistan and International Industries Limited (IIL). A provisional duty of 10.1% was imposed on IIL and 58% on other Pakistani exporters. The provisional dumping margin will remain in effect until the final determination is announced by the CBSA, which is due in January 2019. The CITT’s final decision will be announced in February next year.

“Despite this, there is no financial exposure to IIL for any of our exports to Canada to date,” said an IIL notification on Thursday. “Although our sales to Canada continue for the time being, there may be a slowdown in sales depending on the final injury findings to be issued by the CITT in February 2019.”

It added that IIL had engaged experienced legal counsel in both the countries to aggressively contest the inquiries initiated by the CBSA and CITT. The company expressed confidence that a positive outcome would emerge.

According to Shankar Talreja of Topline Securities, IIL exports Rs1.3 billion worth of its products to Canada “which translates into 5% of its total sales of Rs25 billion and 29% of its total exports of Rs4.47 billion.”

“The sale to Canada was not a major chunk of the company’s total sales, so there wouldn’t be a significant impact,” the analyst added.

Pak-Kuwait Investment Company AVP Research Adnan Sami Sheikh said in comments to The Express Tribune that duties had also been imposed on other countries ranging from as low as 3% on one Turkish company to a high of 95% on other companies of the country.

Sheikh, however, pointed that the duties could be revised in the final decision if there were complaints from the Canadian manufacturers.

Elixir Securities’ Research Analyst Sharoon Ahmed said the variation in anti-dumping duties depended on the level of a company’s dumping margin. “Higher the dumping margin, the higher is the duty so that prices in the domestic market remain stable and indigenous players can also compete,” he said.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 9^th, 2018.

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