Australia has initiated an anti-dumping investigation on painted steel trapping exported from China and Viet Nam. — Photo enternews.vn

Australia’s Anti-dumping Commission has initiated an investigation into alleged dumping and subsidisation on painted steel trapping exported to Australia from China and Viet Nam, according to the Trade Remedies Authority of Viet Nam.

The investigation was initiated following an application lodged by Signode Packaging Group Australia Pty Ltd (Signode), a manufacturer of painted steel trapping in Australia.

According to the Anti-dumping Commission’s notice, the application alleged that the goods had been exported from China and Viet Nam to Australia at prices lower than their normal value.

The alleged dumping and subsidisation caused material injury to the Australian industry producing similar goods through price depression, price suppression, loss of profits, reduced profitability and a decline in capital investment.

In the application, Signode claimed that its production costs increased since 2016 but it had been unable to increase its selling prices due to distributors purchasing dumped and subsidised imports from China and dumped imports from Viet Nam at prices that undercut Signode Australia’s selling prices. The company had to reduce its selling prices in order to maintain sales volumes.

Its average selling price in 2019 declined by 4 per cent whereas costs rose by more than 2 per cent. The company suffered an 80 per cent decline in its domestic profit since 2016.

The Trade Remedies Authority of Viet Nam in its letter to Australia Anti-dumping Commission noted that it had found that the sales of domestic goods increased in 2017 then slightly declined in 2018 and 2019 by around 3 per cent comparing to benchmark of 2016. Meanwhile, the sales of allegedly dumped imports experienced a significant decrease of about 10-25 per cent from 2017-2019.

It meant that the decrease in domestic goods was less than the figure in dumped imports during the examined period.

The Trade Remedies Authority of Viet Nam also said that the depression in exports of steel trapping of Signode could be a reason causing injury to sales, not due to imports of steel trapping which had been allegedly dumped in the Australian market.

The investigation period is April 1, 2019 to March 31, 2020 to determine whether dumping and subsidisation had occurred and analyse injury.

Submissions must be no later than July 3, 2020. — VNS