Groups pan steel duty extension

Groups pan steel duty extension The U.S. International Trade Commission voted Wednesday to extend protective duties on hot-rolled steel from six of 10 countries under review. Groups representing manufacturers who buy foreign steel immediately criticized the decision.
   The ITC voted to continue antidumping and counterveiling duties on China, India, Indonesia, Taiwan, Thailand and Ukraine, and to terminate the duties for Argentina, Kazakhstan, Romania and South Africa.
   Duties on hot-rolled imports from The Netherlands were rescinded earlier.
   The remaining duties will be left in place until the next ITC review in 2012.
   Steve Alexander, executive director for the Consuming Industries Trade Action Coalition, said the duties had “outlived their usefulness” and were damaging to American steel consumers.
   “Today the U.S. steel industry by its own admission is healthy and will continue to be profitable for the foreseeable future while America’s steel consuming industries, who employ 9 million Americans, are struggling with steel supply problems and high prices,” Alexander said.
   He contended the duties “are no longer necessary and are making it difficult for U.S. manufacturers to compete with their global competitors.
   “The ITC’s refusal to end the duties is further evidence that U.S. trade laws are badly in need of reform,” he said. “U.S. trade laws should be used to help manufacturers compete in the global marketplace. Instead, our trade laws are being used by a small group of companies to impose unnecessary taxes in the form of duties on American steel consuming companies.”
   Both the coalition and another trade group, Precision Metalforming Association, called for passage of the American Manufacturing Competitiveness Act (HR 1127), introduced by Rep. Joe Knollenberg, R-Mich., to give industrial users legal standing in trade remedy cases involving those products.