Indian engineering exporters have opposed mandatory registration of steel imports under the Steel Import Monitoring (SIM) system claiming it will increase cost of inputs for engineering good exporters at a time of overall demand slowdown, according to a communication of Engineering Export Promotion Council (EEPC) to the Ministry of Commerce.
“Registration of imports is fine as it will monitor imports. But why levy a fee? It will add to the input costs of the importer. The fee part is discouraging particularly if the importer is bringing in consignment for export production,” an EEPC official said.
The Director General for Foreign Trade (DGFT) last week issued a notification that SIM will require all importers of steel products to submit in advance information online for import of steel products and obtain automatic generated number by paying specified fees.
Any importer could apply for registration not earlier than the 60th day and not later than 15th days before the expected arrival of consignment. A single registration number will be valid for a period of 75 days from logging in.
According to EEPC official the fees will vary according to price of steel and add another variable while pricing exports.
Also, not only registration was made mandatory against a fee, DGFT had also laid down steel specifications for which such registration will be necessary which translated into an import restriction, the official added.