US and EU negotiate new duties on steel – Kommersant

The US and the EU are discussing the terms of tariffs on steel imports, writes Bloomberg with reference to sources. According to them, the new duties are aimed primarily at limiting the “excessive” and insufficiently environmentally friendly steel production in China. Sources note that while the parties have not agreed on the level of duties, the countries that they will affect, and some other details. It is assumed that the conditions must be agreed by 31 October.

Discussion is part of what has been achieved in 2021 agreements between the US and the EU on duties on steel and aluminum. In 2018, the administration of then US President Donald Trump introduced 25% tariffs on steel imports from a number of countries, including the EU. In 2021, the US allowed limited imports of products from the EU if they are made in Europe, which was supposed to stop the practice of importing Chinese steel through the EU to the US. However, that decision was temporary, and the parties agreed to work out a permanent agreement by October 2023. Now, according to sources, in October, most likely, only the next temporary measures will be taken, and the development of a permanent solution will continue.

Now, among other things, we are talking about the requirement of environmentally friendly steel production. This will hit primarily China, which accounts for more than half of the world’s steel production, which, moreover, often does not meet environmental standards. The rapid adoption of the rules is hampered, among other things, by the fact that the US itself, unlike the EU, does not have a well-established methodology for determining harmful emissions from its own steel mills.

Yana Rozhdestvenskaya