India to Impose Antidumping Duties on Turkey, Russia Soda Ash

India will impose antidumping duties on imports of soda ash from Russia and Turkey within the next 60 days, an official from the Indian Ministry of Finance said on Apr. 23, 2013.

The Directorate General of Anti-Dumping and Allied Duties (ADAG) has recommended a $35.99/tonne (€27.71/tonne) ADD for material coming from Russia and a lower rate of $18.39/tonne for caustic soda from Turkey, following a probe that lasted a year, the official said.

It was determined during the antidumping investigation that the margin of dumping between the normal value of soda ash import and the actual import price was at 10-35% for ex-Turkey soda ash, and at 65-70% for shipments ex-Russia, based on the ADAG report.

The probe covered July 2010 to September 2011, termed as the "period of injury", during which imports surged to 85,031 tonnes from 4,960 tonnes that had adverse repercussions in the domestic supply-demand situation and pricing.

As capacity utilization at India's domestic soda ash industry increased to 79.18% from 65.91% over the same period, with actual output rising to 1.55m tonnes from 1.29m tonnes, there was a resulting build-up in inventory given the strong import volumes.

Prevailing high cost of production, logistics and infrastructure make domestic soda ash uncompetitive against imports, according to a spokesperson of the Alkali Manufacturers' Association of India (AMAI) – one of the industry groups that petitioned the imposition of ADD.

With around 75% of soda ash production capacity located in western Indian province of Gujarat, transportation costs to consuming centres in southern and eastern India were around $70-75/tonne, while the difference between a free-on-board (FOB) and landed price at southern and Indian ports for shipments ex-China and ex-Europe was at $40-45/tonne, the AMAI official said.

In July 2012, India had imposed ADDs of $2.38/tonne-$38.79/tonne on soda ash imports from seven countries, namely, Iran, Pakistan, China, Ukraine, Kenya, European Union and US.