India’s Ministry of Steel has recommended to its counterparts in the Ministry of Finance to bring the import duty on ferronickel down to zero from 2.5 percent at present, a senior Indian government official said on Thursday, June 22.
The official said that this was in line with the Ministry of Steel’s stance that all critical inputs for which domestic stainless steel producers are fully import-dependent should be made totally duty free.
It was based on the logic that earlier this year, based on recommendations of the Ministry of Steel, the Indian government had reduced the import duty on nickel from 2.5 percent to zero, and it is expected that the same will be done in the case of ferronickel too, the official added.
According to industry estimates, India has produced an average of around 3.5 million mt of stainless steel per year in the past three years but is 100 percent import-dependent for key inputs like nickel and ferronickel, the bulk of which has to be shipped in from China and Indonesia, the official said.