On 31 Jan. 2012, the Ministry of Commerce of China published an announcement, according to which, Ukraine's government made a decision on 23 Jan. 2012 that the country would run an anti-dumping investigation into China's citric acid, and it has been officially executed since 27 Jan. 2012. The result of this investigation may come out by Jan. 2013. More importantly, it's worried that Ukraine's anti-dumping investigation may arouse unwanted chain reaction that more and more countries will follow suit, according to CCM International’s February issue of Corn Products China News.
Actually, this is not the first time that Ukraine has run anti-dumping investigations into China's citric acid. In May 2003, Ukraine began to run an anti-dumping investigation into the product, and the final decision published in Mar. 2004 stated that Ukraine would levy anti-dumping duty (it was the price spread between CIF price and the bottom price of USD977/t ruled by Ukraine) on China's citric acid in the next five years. For example, if the CIF price of China's citric acid to Ukraine was USD800/t, the duty would be USD177/t. And the very reason behind the anti-dumping investigation in 2003 was that the selling price of China's citric acid in Ukraine was 42.3% lower than that of home-made one in the East European country from 2000 to 2002, resulting in the 13.6% market share decline of Ukraine's producers.
Ukraine's reason for the investigation in 2012 is that it believes from Q4 2010 to Q3 2011, citric acid from China was imported at dumping prices, which could do harm to Ukraine's producers. In fact, according to China Customs, the average export price of China's citric acid was only USD786/t in 2010, much lower than the bottom price of USD977/t. Although from Mar. to June 2011, the monthly average export prices all stayed at over USD1,000/t, other monthly prices were still lower than the bottom price.
In the short run, it's believed that Ukraine's new anti-dumping investigation won't bring much negative effect on China's citric acid industry. Up till now, no Chinese producer has definitely revealed appeals yet, because Ukraine is not a key export destination of China's citric acid in recent years. For instance, the export volume of citric acid to Ukraine during the whole year of 2011 was only about 5,082 tonnes, just accounting for 0.73% of the product's total export volume that year.
But in the long term, it's worried that the Ukraine's investigation may arouse chain reaction that more and more countries will follow suit. For example, on 16 Jan. 2012, the Ministry of Commerce of China published an article, revealing that Thailand is likely to continue levying anti-dumping duty on China's citric acid with the rate of 38.1% in the next five years. Thailand began to run an anti-dumping investigation into China's citric acid in 2003, and the final decision made in 2004 ruled that Thailand would levy a 38.1% anti-dumping duty on China's citric acid in the next five years. And in Jan. 2011, Thailand decided to continue levying 38.1% anti-dumping duty on the product in question from Jan. 2011 to Jan. 2012 in its sunset review.
In 2011, India, Japan, Turkey, Indonesia and Russia were the top 5 export destinations of China's citric acid, whose aggregate import volume of the product reached 177,465 tonnes, accounting for about 25.6% of China's total export volume in the year. At present, these countries haven't taken any anti-dumping or anti-subsidy measures on China's citric acid, but some insiders are still worried that they will follow to run related investigations in the future.
Source: Corn Product China News 1202
http://www.cnchemicals.com/Newsletter/NewsletterDetail_6.html
Content of Corn Products ChinaNews 1202:
Chinese DDGS import volume declines by 46.7% in 2011
Export volume of VB2 witnesses a decline in 2011
Chinese corn products Imp. & Exp. analysis in December 2011
Domestic price of furfural rebounds in 2012
Corn starch price in China enjoys slight uptrend in Feb. 2012
Ukrainehas officially run anti-dumping investigation into China's citric acid
Baolingbao to market IMO end product in H1 2012
Xiwang Sugar witnesses poor performance in Q4 2011
China Starch's expansion plan to be postponed
Northeast Pharmaceutical to lose USD54.0-69.8 million in 2011
Domestic home-made potato starch price heads down in Feb. 2012
11.5%, corn's import volume increases in 2011
Corn Products China News, a monthly publication issued by CCM International on 20th of every month, revealsthe driving force of news storiesand deeply analyzes the influence of trends and dynamicson domestic and international corn deep processing industry.
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