The Brazilian government has imposed tentative anti-dumping tariffs on butyl methacrylate imports from Taiwan for six months, as it found that the chemicals were being sold at unfairly low prices, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said on Saturday.
Brazil launched an investigation in December last year after BASF SA filed a petition in October last year that accused exporters from Taiwan, Germany and South Africa of dumping butyl methacrylate on the Brazilian market.
Based on the initial findings of the investigation, Brazil imposed the tentative tariffs on butyl methacrylate imports from the three countries as a temporary measure.
Butyl methacrylate is a material used in the production of resins, solvents, coatings, adhesives, oil additives, dental products, textile emulsions, leather and paper finishing.
Taiwan’s Formosa Plastics Corp (台塑) has been asked to pay average duties of US$140.08 per tonne of butyl methacrylate exported to Brazil, while German and South African exporters have been slapped with tariffs of US$526.81 and US$585.37 per tonne respectively, according to the ministry.
The Brazilian government is to continue its investigation into the dumping case and is scheduled to issue a final ruling on Aug. 24.
The ministry said it plans to maintain close contact with the Taiwan Synthetic Resin and Adhesives Industrial Association (台灣合成樹脂接著劑公會), the Petrochemical Industry Association of Taiwan (台灣石油化學公會) and the Chinese National Federation of Industries (全國工業總會) to offer any necessary assistance to the affected exporters.
Taiwan exported US$13.82 million of butyl methacrylate to Brazil in 2012, US$12.22 million in 2013 and US$15.46 million last year, which accounted for 0.69 percent to 0.93 percent of its total exports to the South American country, according to Ministry of Finance data.
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