The European Union is ready to take further action if necessary to counter steel dumping by China, European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker said yesterday, as 10,000 jobs hung in the balance in the sector in Britain.
“The steel industry has problems,” Juncker told a sitting of the European Parliament in Strasbourg, pledging support for an industry whose plight some Britons have blamed on EU policies as they campaign for Britain to quit the bloc in a June referendum.
Juncker, a long-time premier of major steel producer Luxembourg, described the sector that employs some 360,000 workers across the EU as a high-technology industry that needed investment and protection.
The Commission opened three anti-dumping investigations in February into imports of Chinese steel products – seamless pipes, heavy plates and hot-rolled flat steel – and has imposed duties on two further products, cold-rolled flat steel and rebar.
“We are now investigating steel production in China to determine whether it is dumped in the market and we will take other measures if necessary,” Juncker told EU lawmakers, without detailing what such measures could be.
Britain is battling to save its steel industry after Tata Steel announced it was putting its British steel operations up for sale, saying this was unavoidable because of a surge in cheap Chinese imports, as well as soaring costs and weak demand.
On Monday, more than 40,000 German steel workers took to the streets to protest against dumping from China, among other issues such as industry consolidation that they fear will cost them their jobs.
Hillary Clinton, widely expected to be the Democrat candidate in US presidential elections this year, added her voice to the criticism, saying on Monday she would “impose consequences when China breaks the rules by dumping its cheap products in our markets.”
Juncker, whose father was a steelworker, was for 19 years prime minister of Luxembourg, home to ArcelorMittal, the world’s biggest steel maker.
China is facing increasing international pressure to tackle the steel supply glut.
It produces half the world’s steel but those hoping it will tackle its surplus capacity quickly will be disappointed, despite rhetoric from Beijing.
A steel production glut that has taken years in the making, will equally take years to resolve.
The economy is growing at its slowest pace in 25 years and labour unrest is on the rise, a worry for the ruling Communist Party that fears the social unrest that millions of laid off steel workers could bring.