Govt plans anti-dumping duty on chemical imports

The Dollar Business Bureau

India is likely to impose anti-dumping duty of up to $0.40 per kg on chemical imports particularly from the US and China to safeguard the interests of the Indian players. The chemicals imported from US and China is mostly used in the domestic pharmaceutical and agrochemicals industry.

Directorate General of Anti-Dumping and Allied Duties (DGAD) that works under the Commerce Ministry has identified that Methyl Acetoacetate has been imported from US and China. This has caused losses to the domestic players who have suffered injury to their material. The DGAD opined that imposition of anti-dumping duty is necessary to indemnify the injury caused due to the dumping from US and China, a source in DGAD revealed in a statement.

Laxmi Organic Industries Ltd is the first company to file a petition against the chemical import. It has urged the government to initiate probe on the anti-dumping duty related to the imports of the chemicals.

After the final findings, the DGAD has suggested to levy anti-dumping duty of $0.24-0.40 per kg on these imported chemicals. Generally, the Finance Ministry imposes the duty recommended by the DGAD.

Many countries investigate anti-dumping to evaluate whether the domestic industry has been injured due to the dumping of low-cost imports. To prevent such incidents, they would levy anti-dumping duties issued by the World Trade Organization (WTO).

Anti-dumping measures are not meant to stop imports or cause unreasonable surge in the prices of the products. These measures would only ensure fair business practices while importing goods. Also they will provide a level-playing field to the domestic players in the industry.