S. Korea may impose anti-dumping duty on Japanese steel plates

S. Korea may impose anti-dumping duty on Japanese steel plates. South Korea’s trade commission will seek the imposition of a 13.17 percent anti-dumping duty on Japanese stainless-steel plates over the next five years. The Korea Trade Commission will ask the finance minister to impose the tax after a probe found dumping of the product by Japan hurt the domestic industry, the Ministry of Knowledge Economy said in an e-mailed statement. The decision came after the commission started an investigation in April that followed a complaint from DKC Corp., South Korea’s sole maker of the product, that its sales fell and it swung to an operating loss because of the imports. The market for the product, used in petrochemical and desalination plants, was estimated to be worth about 350 billion won ($312 million) a year between 2008 and 2009, it said. Japanese products accounted for about 27 percent, it said.