MUMBAI: The Directorate General of Anti-Dumping & Allied Duties (DGAD), under the ministry of commerce and industry has opened at least two anti-dumping investigations concerning import of paper originating in countries such as Indonesia, Thailand, Singapore, China, European Union and the US.
Dumping is a process where a company exports a product at a price lower than the price it normally charges on its own home market. To protect local businesses and markets, countries impose stiff duties on products they believe are being dumped in their national market.
Speaking about anti-dumping duty in late 2017, Rohit Pandit, secretary-general of IPMA said, “The conventional markets for Chinese and Indonesian exporters are the US and the EU. In both these markets, anti-dumping or anti-subsidy tariffs have been imposed on import of paper and paperboard to protect their domestic industries.” According to the gazette notification, Indian paper manufacturers including JK Paper, The West Coast Paper Mills, Tamil Nadu Newsprint and Papers, and Ballarpur Industries filed an application along with relevant information before the authority in accordance with the Customs Tariff Act, 1975 and Customs Tariff (Identification, Assessment and Collection of Anti-Dumping Duty on Dumped articles and for Determination of injury) Rules, 1995 for initiation of anti-dumping investigation concerning imports of ‘uncoated paper’ originating in or exported from Indonesia, Thailand and Singapore. Furthermore, the notification stated that the DGAD found sufficient prima facie evidence of dumping and ‘injury’ to the domestic industry and initiated an investigation into the alleged dumping. It said the applicants have claimed that there is no known difference in the product produced by the applicants and exported from the subject countries. The two are technically and commercially substitutable and hence should be treated as ‘like article’ under the rules. Beside the applicants are five other known producers of the product under consideration in the country, namely, Seshasayee Paper and Boards, Trident Group, International Paper APPM, Orient Paper & Industries, and Century Pulp and Paper.