The European Steel Association (EUROFER) has announced that after four years of deadlock in negotiations, on December 5 the European Commission, Council and Parliament finally reached a political agreement on the modernization of Europe’s Trade Defense Instruments (TDIs).
Axel Eggert, director general of the European Steel Association (EUROFER), has stated that EUROFER welcomes the fact that there has been an agreement, one which is a step forward in improving the EU’s TDIs, adding that they now urge the EU institutions to formally adopt the deal. This compromise is a balance between the views in the Council and the European Parliament, Mr. Eggert added.
According to the EUROFER director general, the agreement is not as ambitious in improving the effectiveness of the EU’s TDIs as the association initially had hoped; however, it contains a number of improvements, such as a minimum target profit of six percent, which represents a safety net for the sector when injury margins are being calculated.
EUROFER has long called for action to improve the EU’s trade defenses. Half of all antidumping measures in force in the EU involve steel imported into the EU market. Of the around 90,000 steel jobs lost since the economic crisis, a very large proportion owe their disappearance to this dumping of unfairly priced foreign steel.
“On balance, this agreement is welcome given that it will speed up the process and should, in principle, help deliver more effective antidumping duties. With the final approval of the new Non-standard Anti-Dumping Methodology (NADM) expected by the end of the current year, the EU will have moved some way towards having, at long last, an overall trade defense regime better suited to current global challenges,” concluded Mr. Eggert.