Government asked to reimpose duties on pipe imports

JAKARTA (JP): Local steel pipe producers have urged the government to reimpose countervailing duties on welded steel pipe imports from China, Japan, South Korea and Singapore after they were revoked earlier this month.

Abas F. Soeriawidjaja, president of PT South East Asia Pipe Industries (SEAPI), said he feared that dumping practices would start again without the duties.

He cited as potential dumping targets several major projects, including the gas pipelines in Sumpal and Suban under Gulf Indonesia Resources, the West Natuna trunkline system, and the gas pipe project spanning South Sumatra and Singapore under PT Perusahaan Gas Negara.

The projects in Sumpal, Suban and West Natuna alone needed a total of about 90,000 tons of welded steel pipes, he said on Tuesday.

"The government should be consistent in protecting local industries, especially since the country's economy has not recovered yet," Abas said.

The Indonesian Antidumping Committee (KADI) imposed temporary countervailing duties of between 5 percent and 81 percent on welded steel pipes from China, Japan, South Korea and Singapore in July last year, after finding strong evidence that producers sold their products here below their production cost.

The duties were scheduled to be removed in November last year, but the government only revoked them this month after finding that petitioners for the duty had also used dumped products for their business.

The Ministry of Finance earlier said the use of dumped products had led to the petitioners' own sales dropping below 25 percent of the country's total market volume. This meant their petition was no longer valid.

The World Trade Organization requires petitioners for antidumping duties to possess at least 25 percent of the market.

Abas said that after KADI notified producers of the countervailing duties' time limit in November, his company had sent in a new petition for the imposition of duties specifically for longitudinally welded steel pipes, which SEAPI produces.

He said the new petition was based on evidence of dumping practices on the West Natuna gas project. The project orders longitudinally welded steel pipes from Japan through Marubeni trading house, which is supplied by Sumitomo, NKK and Kawasaki.

The West Natuna trunkline is being built by a consortium of Conoco, Gulf Indonesia Resources and British Premier, with PT McDermott Indonesia as contractor.

Abas claimed some 120,000 tons of longitudinally welded pipes were dumped into the country through the Batam Port between October 1999 and January 2000.

"The thing is that longitudinally welded steel pipes are needed in the projects, and they are the ones that have been dumped into Indonesia between 1999 and 2000," he said.

SEAPI produced longitudinally welded steel pipes with a diameter of between 24 inches and 48 inches, at a capacity of 200,000 tons a year, Abas said.

The company accounted for more than 25 percent of local steel pipe production and therefore complied with the WTO's benchmark to be a petitioner, he said. (tnt)