Steel and Base Metals in the TDI Practice of the EU

Steel and base metals stand at the core of the European Union’s trade defence practice. Numerous anti-dumping, anti-subsidy, and anticircumvention measures are applied to imports of steel and other metal products, supplemented by the steel safeguard measure. The EU’s focus is not limited to steel products, but extends to aluminium, ferro-alloys and other base metals. Despite the extensive use of trade defence measures, the current legal framework shows shortcomings to provide sufficient protection against unfair imports of steel and base metal products from countries such as China, Russia and India. To address the calls from the EU industry that the existing measures are insufficient, especially with the upcoming expiry of the steel safeguard measure, the EU recently introduced a new tool designed specifically to counter the adverse effects of global steel overcapacity, the scope of which may expand to cover other metals in the future.