Jan. 10 (Bloomberg) -- China is likely to impose temporary tariffs on imports of U.S. dried distillers’ grains after announcing last month it would begin an anti-dumping probe, said Feng Lichen, general manager at Yigu Information Consulting Ltd.

China is “certain” to apply taxes on the commodity, known as DDGS, judging by a case last year when it imposed preliminary tariffs on U.S. poultry before the investigation was complete, Feng said by phone from Dalian. A call to Yao Jian, a spokesman for the Ministry of Commerce, was not answered.

China on Dec. 28 started a probe into U.S. shipments of DDGS for alleged subsidies. While the government didn’t mention how imports may be treated during the investigation which it said may last a year, it will likely want to slow the shipments by applying a temporary tariff, Feng said. Yigu Information specializes in providing information on China’s corn market and operates the industry website yumi.com.cn.

“Industry observers believe a 50-percent tariff is likely,” said Ge Huanna, analyst at Wanda Futures Co., by phone from Beijing. “It may not halt imports completely because it takes time for feed makers to adjust formula, but it’ll significantly reduce the volume of trade.”

China may import nearly 3 million metric tons of DDGS this year, compared with 600,000 tons last year, Feng estimated.

In September 2009, China began an investigation into U.S. chicken products for anti-dumping, before imposing tariffs in the following February.