During the roundtable discussion held at the Ministry of Enterprise and Made in Italy (MIMIT) with the main energy-intensive industries, the Italian foundry trade association Assofond warned the enterprise minister, Adolfo Urso, that the sector “is on the verge of a production shutdown.”
The Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) was designed to prevent the relocation of emissions, but paradoxically it is putting European foundries in crisis.
The main problem concerns an error in the regulatory scope. European foundries have to import raw materials (such as pig iron and ferroalloys) - as local resources are insufficient to meet demand - paying a carbon tax of up to 35 percent. Non-EU producers, on the other hand, can use their own raw materials or purchase them at low cost from Russia to generate finished or semi-finished products they will export to Europe without paying any duties, because such products are classified under customs codes that do not fall within the scope of CBAM.
Risks for the foundry industry
According to Fabio Zanardi, president of Assofond, the industry is going through a period of extreme fragility. In addition to extremely low margins due to energy costs and market weakness, Italian and European foundries face the risk of losing their competitiveness, as price increases will make them too expensive compared to non-EU competitors who do not pay taxes on raw materials.
Furthermore, it must be considered that the shutdown of foundries would affect strategic downstream sectors, such as automotive, mechanical engineering, construction and energy.
Requests to the government
To avoid irreversible deindustrialization in Italy and Europe, Assofond has asked MIMIT to take urgent action to extend the transition period to 2026-27, transforming it into an “evaluation period” and including the customs codes reported in the CBAM framework to remove the competitive advantage of non-EU producers.
“Without this correction,” continued Zanardi, “the mechanism as it is now will not protect the environment, but will only destroy the most virtuous European industry to the benefit of the more polluting non-EU industry.”