South Africa slaps duty on Chinese unframed mirrors

13/03/2013 12:00 - 418 Views

PROVISIONAL duty of 40.2% has been imposed on imports of unframed mirrors from China following an application to the International Trade Administration Commission (Itac).

The application, which was gazetted on Friday, was made by South Africa’s sole manufacturer of the product, PFG Building Glass, at the end of last year. South Africa has of late seen unprecedented levels of requests for protection from several industries.

Duties have recently been imposed on windscreens and an investigation is continuing into food imports. A waiver on duty was placed on imports of bitumen because of a shortage. Bitumen is used in the construction of roads.

Itac said on Friday the move on Chinese mirrors followed an investigation in November last year after PFG claimed that Chinese manufacturers were selling the product cheaper in South Africa than in China.

PFG is a division of the PG Group and produces 260,000 tons of float glass and 30,000 tons of patterned glass products a year.

Itac chief commissioner Siyabulela Tsengiwe said the commission had found prima facie evidence that unframed mirrors from China were imported into the Southern African Customs Union (Sacu) at dumped prices, causing material injury to the local manufacturers.

Itac had received no responses from manufacturers or exporters in China or from importers in the Sacu region after inviting a response from concerned parties.

The provisional duty will be effective for a period of 26 weeks, after which interested parties can comment on the preliminary findings of the commission before it makes its final determination and recommendation to Trade and Industry Minister Rob Davies.

Donald MacKay, a director at XA International Trade Advisors, said South Africa was seeing unprecedented levels of protectionism at the moment. "It is clear the glass industry in South Africa is experiencing tough times."

The PFG application follows an announcement at the end of last month that the import duty on windscreens from East Asia will be doubled to 30%.

But the Itac move has raised concern that increased duties could be inflationary and could, in the long term, make South African industries less competitive.

"There is certainly a concern that if you keep pushing duties up it will be the consumer who ends up paying for it," Mr MacKay said. "It is an invisible tax, but a tax that is ultimately paid by consumers."

Itac increased the import duty on windscreens from 15% to 30%, despite objections from a number of local importers and the original equipment manufacturers. The commission believed the additional tariff support would improve the competitiveness of the domestic industry.

Further, on Friday the commission published in the Government Gazette the termination of the recommended antidumping duties on whole chickens and boneless cuts from Brazil. This comes after Mr Davies’ earlier rejection of its recommendation that "definitive anti-dumping duties" be imposed against importers of chickens from Brazil.

Itac also published the termination and reinstatement of a probe into the import of frozen potato chips after a technical error in its initial investigation notice to the World Trade Organisation’s safeguard committee.

12 March 2013, 08:03

By Amanda Visser

Source: bdlive.co.za