India’s steel imports decline 29% in May 2016

The Dollar Business Bureau


India’s steel imports in May dropped to its lowest in over 14 months, after the government imposed restrictions on cheap overseas supplies of the metal.

According to Steel Ministry reports, steel imports plunged 29% to 1.2 million tonnes in the first two months of the current fiscal.

India imported 546,000 metric tonnes of steel in May this year as against 924,000 tonnes in the same month last year.

In February this year, the government had imposed a floor price on imports of 173 steel products. In March, it extended import taxes on a few steel products until 2018.

Last month, the government had imposed a temporary anti-dumping duty on pipes and seamless tubes imported from China.

India has, for long, been taking measures to restrict dumping of cheap steel from China, Japan, and South Korea.

India’s steel imports stood at $11.70 billion in 2015 as against $11.29 billion in 2014. Its top five suppliers of the metal were China, Korea, Japan, USA, and UAE.

Some domestic steel manufacturers such as Tata Steel, JSW Steel and Kalyani Steels have been pushing the government for more protective actions.

Last week, Indian credit rating agency ICRA had projected the country’s steel imports to decline significantly during the first half of the current fiscal, especially once the impacts of the minimum import price(MIP) begins to reflect.