Taipei, May 30, 2012 (CENS)--The International Trade Commission (ITC) under the Ministry of Economic Affairs has dismissed the charge filed earlier by Taiwan’s largest steelmaker China Steel Corp. against illegal dumping of carbon steel plates made in Korea and India into the Taiwanese market.

Based on the results of its research on import volume along with price flux and domestic industrial economy affected, ITC makes the initial ruling that imports of carbon steel plates from the two said foreign countries impact the domestic industry moderately, so the China Steel’s accusation of illegal dumping is rejected.

ITC commissioners explained that carbon steel plates with thickness of over 6mm, mainly for use in vessel building and steel structuring in Taiwan, are mostly supplied by local steelmakers, with China Steel having maintained a dominant share of 85% in the segment in the past five years, during which imports from Korea and India accounted for only 5% of the total.

Additionally, the commissioners furthered that Korea and India’s imports, although cheaper than homemade carbon steel plates, are also proven not to negatively affect domestic prices and local steelmakers’ profits, considering the fact that such products are exported by the two foreign countries to other marketplaces at even lower prices tan to Taiwan. Therefore, the competent authority decided to dismiss the case.

The dismissal allows foreign steel suppliers involved in the accusation, including Dongkuk Steel, Posco and Hyundai Steel of Korea and Sail and Essar of India, to heave a sign of relief, but is a disappointment to China Steel.

With ITC issuing the initial ruling in disfavor, the Taiwanese steelmaker stressed that it will manage to collect the most possible market information related to this case and then resort to administrative remedies to safeguard interests of local upstream suppliers and downstream customers in the industry.

In fact, in addition to this case, China Steel also filed other two anti-dumping lawsuits against Chinese and Korean importers of cold rolled products of carbon steel and Japanese suppliers of non-oriented electromagnetic steel products, respectively, but decided to drop them earlier for unknown reasons.