August 22, 2008

US starts AD & CVD investigation on Chinese steel pipe imports

The US Department of Commerce has initiated the antidumping and countervailing duty investigations against China for import of circular welded carbon steel pipes, a formal step that will be followed by a preliminary determination in July of whether to impose duties.

The US International Trade Commission is scheduled to make its preliminary injury determination on or about July 23rd 2007. If the ITC determines that there is a reasonable indication that imports from China are materially injuring, or threatening material injury to, the domestic industry, the investigations will continue and Commerce will be scheduled to make its preliminary countervailing duty determination in August 2007, and its preliminary antidumping duty determination in November 2007.

The merchandise covered by these investigations includes certain circular welded carbon quality steel pipes and tubes with an outside diameter of 0.372 inches or more but not more than 16 inches, generally known as standard pipe and structural pipe. Circular welded carbon quality steel pipe is classifiable under subheadings 7306.30.10.00, 7306.30.50.25, 7306.30.50.32, 7306.30.50.40, 7306.30.50.55, 7306.30.50.85, and 7306.30.50.90 of the Harmonized Tariff Schedule of the United States.

The import statistics for these goods into US are as under

	2004	2005	2006
Volume	242,644	337,657	589,420
Value	138.463	213.817	331.853

Volume in tonnes
Value in million USD

Supporting the petition are a coalition of US steel pipe and tube producers and the United Steelworkers union. The list includes Allied Tube & Conduit of Illinois, IPSCO Tubulars Inc at Kentucky, Northwest Pipe Company at Oregon, Sharon Tube Company at Pennsylvania, Western Tube & Conduit Corporation at California, Wheatland Tube Company at New Jersey and the United Steel Workers are the petitioners for these investigations.