On 27 September 2023, the Ministry of Investment, Trade and Industry (“
MITI”) issued its final determination under the Countervailing and Anti-Dumping Duties Act 1993 and the Countervailing and Anti-Dumping Duties Regulations 1994 in respect of the importation of cold-rolled products of alloy or non-alloy steel with a width less than 1300mm in coils, sheets or any other form (“
subject merchandise”) originating or exported from Japan. This anti-dumping duties investigation was initiated on 31 January 2023 upon a petition lodged by Mycron Steel CRC Sdn Bhd, a producer of the subject merchandise in Malaysia, who sought anti-dumping duties of 22.62% of the value of the subject merchandise exported.
After a full investigation of the matter, MITI found that in certain cases the export price of the subject merchandise was lower than its normal value in Japan and the domestic industry in Malaysia producing the like merchandise had suffered material injury in terms of import volume, market share, sales volume and turnover, production and capacity utilisation, productivity, cash flow, inventories, return on investment and return on total assets, that can be reasonably linked to the importation of the subject merchandise into Malaysia. The Minister of Investment, Trade and Industry (“
Minister”) issued a Notice of Affirmative Final Determination in this regard.
1
Notably however, MITI found that the domestic industry is not capable of producing all specifications and/or characteristics of the subject merchandise required by the local manufacturing industries in Malaysia. For this reason, imports of the subject merchandise in the form of tin mill black plate, and other subject merchandise imported for automotive and electric and electronic (E&E) end usages have been excluded from the scope of this investigation
2 and have expressly been excluded from any anti-dumping duties.
The Minister of Finance, through the Customs (Anti-Dumping Duties) Order 2023 have thus imposed anti-dumping duties on the imports of the non-excluded subject merchandise ranging from 9.03% for one particular Japanese producer/exporter who had participated and responded to the petition whilst all other producers/exporters of the subject merchandise from Japan who did not participate in the investigation are subject to anti-dumping duties of 22.62% of the value of the subject merchandise exported.
3
In respect of two other Japanese producers/exporters who had participated and responded to the petition (“
relevant companies”), MITI found that the dumping margin with regard to the subject merchandise is
de minimis where the dumping margin is less than two per centum of the export price. The Minister accordingly issued a Notice of Negative Final Determination in relation to the relevant companies.
4 Therefore, imports of all subject merchandise from the relevant companies are not subjected to any anti-dumping duties and any provisional anti-dumping duties that had been imposed on the relevant companies are to be released.
The anti-dumping duties apply for a five-year period from 29 September 2023 to 28 September 2028.
Lim Koon Huan (Partner), Manshan Singh (Partner) and Ho Pui Yan (Associate) of our Anti-Dumping and Trade Remedies Practice acted for a number of interested parties in the matter.