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PrintChina's steel associations will take up cudgels on behalf of producers if the US government launches a probe into whether Chinese mills are dumping steel pipes in the US market, China Daily reported last Friday, quoting a senior industry official.
The official from the China Chamber of Commerce of Metals, Minerals and Chemicals Importers and Exporters, made the comment after seven US steel manufacturers last week accused Chinese rivals of illegally dumping certain steel products, chiefly pipes, which are used in the extraction oil and gas.
He said the petition by American steel mills, including behemoth US Steel Corp., will not only affect manufacturers, but also trading enterprises if the US government imposed punitive duties on certain Chinese steel products.
Officials from the China Iron and Steel Association declined to comment on the issue.
The steelmakers' petition to the US Department of Commerce and the US International Trade Commission argues that Chinese steel manufacturers benefit from subsidies for the so-called "oil country tubular goods," which are then sold in the US market.
"Nearly one-third of the pipe manufacturing organizations we represent are experiencing layoffs," Gary Hubbard, a spokesman for United Steelworkers, a union representing workers at US steel mills, said. "China continues to divert its products to our market, and if we sit back and do nothing we will lose our production capacity."
The petition, he said, sought "to assure that we will have the jobs when the market bounces back from the current recession".
The union said US steel pipe imports from China had increased to 2.2 million mt in 2008 from 900,000 mt in 2007, and is worth an estimated $2.7 billion.
Since 2007, the US has launched several anti-dumping and countervailing investigations on some steel products from China and imposed duties on some, such as circular welded carbon quality steel pipe and light-walled rectangular pipe and tube. –Platts
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