US anti-dumping verdict on Oman pipe exports in Oct 

(MENAFN - Muscat Daily) The US Department of Commerce will announce the final verdict on its anti-dumping investigation on steel-pipe imports from Oman on October 15.In 2011, based on allegations made by some large US steel-pipe manufacturers the commerce department filed an anti-dumping suit against UAE, Oman, India and Vietnam for selling steel pipes below fair prices.In May this year, it announced a preliminary anti-dumping duty on imports of circular welded carbon quality steel pipes from Oman pending a final verdict. Al Jazeera Steel Products Company was named the mandatory respondent in the US investigation.''The verdict is due on 15th October 2012 when the US Department of Commerce will determine if the anti-dumping duty levied on us stays or is revised,'' said Al Jazeera Steel in a filing to the Muscat Securities Market on Thursday.''In case duties fall below two per cent the entire proceedings are dismissed. If not, the International Trade Commission (ITC) will hear the case on October 17 and may question a few associates and officers of our company."Finally, end-November the ITC will determine and give the final verdict as to if the US economy has been harmed by the exports of Al Jazeera Steel within the period of investigation and pegs the final anti-dumping percentage,'' the company disclosure added.Speaking to Muscat Daily, Dr Bhaskar Dutta, CEO of Al Jazeera Steel, said that the preliminary anti-dumping duty was nominal and even with the additional cost the firm is doing well in terms of exports to North America.He said, ''The US is quite a significant market for us. Our export volumes to the US totalled 36,000 tonnes in 2011 and we continue to do well this year as well."Our customers in North America rely on us because of the quality of our products and the ability to meet delivery commitments over the last decade. However, we could have done better if there was no anti-dumping duty in the US on us.''The Oman government has provided full support during the period of investigation and verification and the representative at WTO in Geneva has fully co-operated in matters where the US Department of Commerce is not strictly following WTO rulings."We are trying our best and expect that with all the facts and figure provided by the company and the Government of Oman the duty would be lowered further,'' added Dutta.