The Hindu Business Line : Anti-dumping duty on lead acid battery imports to be discontinued

THE Designated Authority in the Commerce Ministry has recommended discontinuation of the anti-dumping duty it had imposed on imported lead acid batteries from Chinese Taipei, Hong Kong and Singapore.

After a mid-term review of the anti-dumping duty of the subject goods, the Authority, through a notification, conclusively stated that lead acid batteries originating in or exported from subject countries had been exported to India above normal value, resulting in no dumping.

The landed value of the subject goods is above the net sales realisation and non-injurious price determined for the domestic industry.

Hence, the domestic industry has not suffered material injury due to imports. And any discontinuation of anti-dumping duties on the subject goods from subject countries is not likely to lead to the recurrence of injury and dumping.

Exide Industries Ltd and Amara Raja Batteries Ltd made the original petition seeking imposition of anti-dumping duty on behalf of domestic industry.

In its mid-term review seeking to ascertain whether the anti-dumping duty could be continued or discontinued, the Authority found that the imports from subject countries has decreased during the period of investigation (PoI). In terms of market share in imports, the share of subject countries in this investigation has decreased from 30.61per cent during 2000-01 to 3.02 per cent during the PoI, which was coming at un-dumped prices during the PoI, not causing injury to the domestic industry. It further held that another mid-term review probe concerning imports of lead acid batteries originating in or exported from China, South Korea, Japan and Bangladesh has been concluded with the same period of investigation.

The market share in import from these countries too has decreased from 59.62 per cent during 2000-01 to 41.85 per cent during the PoI.

The Authority found that the sales of domestic industry have increased from 76,60,033 pieces to 12,854.661 pieces during the PoI as compared to the base year.

The sales in volume terms of the domestic industry have increased by 67.81 per cent and in value terms by 21.60 per cent.

As regards capacity utilisation, the domestic industry is able to utilise its capacity to the extent of 87.54 per cent during the PoI compared to the base year of 80.61 per cent.

The Authority further established that the landed value of imports from the subject countries is higher than the net sales realisation of the domestic industry for the subject goods during the PoI, thereby not undercutting the selling price of the domestic industry. The undercutting margin was within a range of -35 per cent to -115 per cent during the PoI.

It noted that market share of the domestic industry had increased in demand during the PoI from 81.60 per cent in 2000-01 to 84.59 per cent during the PoI.

The undumped imports from subject countries constitute about 3.01 per cent of total imports and imports from all sources subject to anti-dumping duty constitute about 44.87 per cent of total imports.

It may be noted that the landed value of imports from the sources attracting anti-dumping duty is much above the landed value of imports from sources not attracting duty.

Further, a parallel mid-term review probe on imports of lead acid batteries from China, South Korea, Japan and Bangladesh which accounts for 41.95 per cent of imports from all sources has been concluded "with the recommendation of discontinuance of anti-dumping duty," the Authority said in this notification.

Though the domestic industry argued that dumping is still continuing from the subject countries and causing injury to the domestic industry, it did not substantiate with evidence in support of its apprehension of imminent injury when the dumping margin was negative from the subject countries, the Authority held.

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