The European Union expanded tariffs on aluminum foil from China by targeting low-weight rolls to help German, French and other EU producers compete with cheaper imports.

The duties as high as 35.4 percent punish Chinese exporters such as CeDo Shanghai Co. for selling the wrapping in the 27- nation EU below cost, a practice known as dumping. The levies cover aluminum foil in rolls that don’t exceed 10 kilograms (22 pounds) -- a type used for consumer packaging -- and follow EU anti-dumping duties on heavier rolls from China.

European manufacturers of low-weight rolls including Germany’s Fora Folienfabrik GmbH, France’s Sphere Group and Italy’s Cuki Cofresco SpA have suffered “material injury” as a result of dumped imports from China, the European Commission, the EU’s trade authority in Brussels, said today in the Official Journal. The anti-dumping duties, due to take effect tomorrow, are for six months and may be prolonged for five years.

Aluminum foil in small rolls is produced by rewinding, cutting and packaging the foil on jumbo rolls. In 2009, the EU imposed five-year duties as high as 30 percent on Chinese aluminum foil in rolls with a weight exceeding 10 kilograms, a step designed to help European producers such as Poland’s Grupa Kety SA (KTY) and Bulgaria’s Alcomet.

At the time, the bloc cited the risk that the Chinese industry would shift production to consumer rolls as a result of the trade protection and thereby threaten European “rewinders” that are the main users of the heavier rolls.

Market Share

While European rewinders urged the EU to include consumer rolls in the scope of the anti-dumping duties imposed in 2009, the bloc rejected the request. It said any unfair trading by China of consumer rolls would have to be examined separately and any switch by the Chinese industry to this segment “in larger quantities would very likely take some time.”

Chinese exporters increased their combined share of the EU market for aluminum foil in low-weight rolls to 13.4 percent in the 12 months through September 2011 from 4.5 percent in 2008, the commission said today.

The six-month duties are the preliminary outcome of an inquiry that the commission opened last December after a dumping complaint by the European Association of Metals on behalf of producers that account for more than 50 percent of EU output of aluminum foil in low-weight rolls. The levies range from 13 percent to 35.4 percent, depending on the Chinese company.

EU governments, acting on a proposal from the commission, must decide within six months whether to turn the provisional anti-dumping duties into “definitive” levies lasting for five years. The rates of any definitive duties can change.