Brazil approves anti-dumping duties against Arabs

Brasília – The Foreign Trade Chamber (Camex, in the Portuguese acronym) of the Brazilian Ministry of Development, Industry and Foreign Trade approved last Thursday (3th) anti-dumping measures against six countries. Dumping is the commercial practice whereby a country exports products at lower prices than those charged domestically in order to cause problems to its competitors. Whenever the practice is confirmed via a probe, imports of the products at hand from the dumping country can be overtaxed.

One of the products on which the anti-dumping duty will be levied is flat glass, used in the auto, civil construction, decoration and furniture industries. The measure applies to product imported from China, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, the United States and Mexico. The surcharge ranges from US$ 17.40 to US$ 334.35 per tonne, for the next six months.

Anti-dumping duties will also be levied on China on imports of glass used in home appliances, ceramic filters used for filtering liquid metals, and porcellanite for flooring. The anti-dumping surcharge on glass for appliances will range from US$ 2.74 to US$ 5.45 per square metre, depending on the exporting company at hand. For filters, the surcharge will be US$ 6.06 per kilogram of product, valid for up to five years. For porcellanite, the surcharge ranges from US$ 3.01 to US$ 5.73 per square metre and will remain in effect for up to six months.

The right to apply anti-dumping duties may be granted permanently or temporarily. Provisional authorizations occur whenever probes uncover signs of dumping. They are valid for up to six months and may be converted into permanent authorizations. The latter occur following more thorough probes and is valid for up to five years.

On Thursday, the Camex also approved the inclusion of six products on the Exception List to the Mercosur Common External Tariff (Letec, in the Portuguese acronym). The list contains up to 100 products. When a product is added, its Import Tax rate can be raised or lowered in relation to the one applied by the Latin American bloc’s countries.

The rate levied on the products added to the list has been raised. The rates have gone from 4% to 25% for white mineral oils such as Vaseline and paraffin; from 10% to 25% for sodium bicarbonate; from 10% to 30% for fats and vegetable oils; from 2% to 30% for linoleic acid; and from 14% to 25% for machining centres and reducers. The rate for peach has been lowered from 55% to 35% and cement, which was formerly exempt, will now have a 4% rate levied.