Restore duty on import of stainless steel from China and Indonesia in Budget: Jindal Stainless

New Delhi, Jan 2 (FN Agency) With Budget 2022 just a month away, leading stainless steel maker Jindal Stainless has urged the government to restore import duty on stainless steel coming from China and Indonesia to protect domestic industry. Speaking to UNI, Jindal Stainless Ltd (JSL) Managing Director Abhyuday Jindal said that India is the only country which is open for stainless steel dumping. He said that in absence of level-playing field to domestic stainless steel producers the government needs to shield the sector. “India is the only country that is open for stainless steel dumping. Earlier there was duty (on import) from China, Indonesia. In the last Budget they were removed at once. So what happened that immediately within few months imports from China increased by 185%. So, if the country remains wide open for imports, companies from China, Indonesia would benefit. Not only Jindal Stainless but other stainless steel manufacturers will also die a natural death,” said Jindal. In the wake of surge in primary steel hurting the downstream companies especially MSMEs, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman had in last Budget reduced customs duty uniformly to 7.5% on semis, flat, and long products of non-alloy, alloy, and stainless steels.

The Budget had also revoked the Countervailing duty (CVD) on imports of flat products of stainless steel, originating in or exported from Indonesia. It also revoked the CVD on imports of certain hot rolled and cold rolled stainless steel flat products, originating in or exported from China. A year later, the steel prices however remain high and pinching the secondary producers. The MSME sector has repeatedly complained of high input costs eroding their margins and making survival difficult. While attributing the rise in steel prices to international trends and sharp increase in input costs, Abhyuday Jindal said that the industry needs a level-playing field to compete with rivals from China and Indonesia. He called for investment in logistics sector to make stainless steel sector competitive with their global peers and also steps to reduce cost of borrowing. “When we say level playing field, logistics cost is much higher in India than other countries. Logistics is one area government needs to invest a lot but infrastructure creation takes time. So till the time infrastructure support comes in we need duty support. The kind of interest rates, long-term loans banks give to companies in their countries we don’t see that support here. We have at times to run to NBFCs, we have to run to foreign banks but in other countries we see that complete expansion and growth is supported by local banks,” he elaborated. “That banking channel level field is required. Power in our country is very expensive. If I compare from Odisha to Gujarat to Haryana there are so many varying different costs… duty structure in our country is not very clear. In GST, you have inverted duty structure,” Jindal added.