Safeguard duties on steel imports into the EU

Priority question for written answer  P-001087/2021
to the Commission
Rule 138
Petri Sarvamaa (PPE)

It is extremely important that safeguard duties on steel imports into the EU, which became applicable as of June 2018, should continue after June 2021. At the same time, the rules on safeguard quotas should be improved by making them more specific, as significantly different types of steel alloy have been included in same category. For example, carbon steel and stainless steel alloys which are included in the same category are used in totally different applications and are not substitutive. Carbon steel and stainless steel alloys also have different manufacturing processes, main countries of export, end use purposes and trade values.

• 1.Does the Commission aim to prolong the safeguard duties after June 2021? This is an extremely important and necessary decision.
• 2.If prolonging the safeguard duties is decided and implemented, category 21 ‘Hollow sections’ products should be split in two groups: carbon steel and stainless steel[1]. Will the Commission include this separation in the safeguard rules?

• [1] This would involve splitting the relevant category into two (cf. category 4) to create category 21a (‘Stainless hollow sections’, 7306 6110) and category 21b (‘Other hollow sections’, 7306 6192 and 7306 6199). The countries which would qualify to have country-specific quotas (with a market share of less than 5 %) in the new category 21a (‘Stainless hollow sections’, 7306 6110) would be: China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Turkey and India).