WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Commerce Department said on Wednesday it imposed duties on Chinese and Mexican structural steel after making a preliminary determination that producers in both countries had dumped fabricated structural steel on the U.S. market at prices below fair market value.
The department said it imposed duties of up to 141% on Chinese structural steel and up to 31% on Mexican structural steel and will begin collecting cash deposits for imports based on those rates.
Commerce said it had found that imports of Canadian fabricated structural steel did not violate U.S. anti-dumping laws.
Most Chinese steel products have largely been excluded from the U.S. market by prior Commerce Department anti-dumping duties and President Donald Trump's 25 percent punitive tariffs. The latest order seeks to prevent Chinese downstream structural steel assemblies from skirting those duties and entering the United States.
Commerce found that one Chinese producer, Modern Heavy Industries (Taicang) Co Ltd, did not dump product into the United States, but it imposed dumping rates of 52% on Wison (Nanton) Heavy Industry Co Ltd and up to 141% on other Chinese fabricators.
The department is scheduled to release final anti-dumping duties in its fabricated structural steel investigation on or about Jan. 24, 2020. The U.S. International Trade Commission needs to find that American steel fabricators suffered injury from Chinese and Mexican imports for the duties to be locked in place for a five-year period.
In 2018, U.S. imports of fabricated structural steel were valued at from $722.5 million (588.5 million pounds) from Canada, $897.5 million from China, and $622.4 million from Mexico, Commerce said.
The products covered by the investigation are prefabricated from beams, girders, columns plates and flanges for erection or assembly into structures, such as buildings, parking decks, hospitals, arenas and ports. The investigation excludes concrete reinforcing bar structures, steel bridge sections, pre-fabricated steel buildings and steel utility poles, among other products.