STEEL INDUSTRY: Conducting your business with the DUTIES-SWORD hanging over your head

STEEL INDUSTRY

Conducting your business

WITH THE DUTIES-SWORD HANGING OVER YOUR HEAD

How does the import duties affect your business?

(click here to share your experience)

Below is the testimony from one of our members

Dear Mr Papenfus

Since 2015 I have been conducting my steel business under the sword of duties (and looming duties) protecting AMSA – it is agonizing.

From within the industry, circumstances have been of such a nature that we believed that there is no chance of duties being implemented. There have been constant shortages, quality problems and overpriced steel being sold by AMSA and yet, against all odds, duties were introduced.

Lately the odds, according to us operating within the industry, were even lower that more duties would be introduced and surprisingly the so-called safeguard-duties on hot rolled coil were extended. It reminds me of the CNN presenter that reported on the destruction of Aleppo in Syria: When I first saw what was happening, I thought it couldn’t get worse, but it did, a lot worse. That is exactly what we fear, since there are more duties looming. We are convinced that there is absolutely no chance that government would be so irrational to introduce more duties on coated products, but should we fear the worst? – for the sake of thousands of jobs, we hope not.

There is a severe shortage on coated flat products due to AMSA’s inability to supply the market. The cherry on the cake came when they declared force majeure and also cannot supply long products from Newcastle.

We all wish for the touch of a wand to make this unnecessary sword disappear.

Regards

We are all in this together.
Privileged and challenged to be South African.