Ukraine Government refuses higher export duty on scrap
Ukrainian president Kuchma has rejected the proposal of the parliament to impose 30% of export duty on scrap exports which Instead he proposed to implement duty at the rate of 18%. It came as a surprise that the parliament proposal was not passed without questioning by Kuchma, disapproval of whom is seen as a consequence of the European Commission's implications that cutting down the quota allocations of Ukraine on steel imports into the EU in such case. The proposal was aiming to avoid the supply shortage of scrap to the domestic producers as the Ukrainian domestic mills have been suffering huge lack of scrap and high levels of prices in line with the short supply.