India will not see a significant impact of US anti-dumping duties on aluminium alloy sheets: Biswajit Dhar of JNU

According to a recent survey, India is expected to be not significantly affected by the anti-dumping duties imposed by the United States on common alloy aluminium sheets, as the former supplies small amount of the product to the latter.

Late last week, the United States Department of Commerce announced to immediately impose preliminary anti-dumping duties on imports of aluminium alloy sheets from 18 countries, including Germany, Bahrain, Brazil, Spain, India and Italy.

Biswajit Dhar of the Jawaharlal Nehru University explained, “As we sell such sheets in limited quantity to the US, the impact would not be significant. It is a reflection of the countries impacted by Covid-19 adopting protectionist measures on one pretext or another.”

Over 70 countries have notified the WTO of having taken protectionist measures because of the outbreak of COVID-19. But India has not informed the WTO about the measures it has taken as New Delhi is not a signatory to some WTO agreements.

“The department’s aluminium sheet investigations constitute the broadest US trade enforcement action in two decades,” said US secretary of commerce Wilbur Ross in a statement. 

The United States anti-dumping duties on Indian aluminium alloy imports are estimated to range between 0-47.92 per cent, said the US Commerce Department. German will face the highest duties ranging from 52-132 per cent, followed by Bahrain, as investigations have shown that these two countries subsidized their prices the most to export to the United States.

Analysts said the anti-dumping measures would not have a significant impact on the forthcoming third round of 2+2 ministerial dialogue on 26-27 October between India and the US.