Fifteen EU safeguard quotas reach critical level

Fifteen tariff-free quota allocations within the EU safeguard system have reached a critical level, Kallanish learns from the official calculation system provided by the European Commission.

Despite the overall downturn in imports seen during the first half of the year, importers of some key products will need to wait until the beginning of October for new allocations to become available.

As anticipated, rebar quotas for both Turkey and Russia have been completely exhausted. Tariff-free quotas for Turkish and Russian wire rod are almost completely finished. Hollow sections, angle shapes and merchant bars imports from Turkey will also need to wait until the beginning of October for new quotas.

In the flat products sector, organic coated sheet quotas have been exhausted for the “other countries” group as well as for Turkey. Metallic coated sheet from India – not for the automotive sector – has also used up almost all allocations, as has Chinese metallic coated sheet specifically for the automotive sector.

In the stainless area, cold rolled coil quotas from other countries and Vietnam are also nearly finished. Finally, Turkish gas pipe has used all available quotas.

Based on the imports seen during the first six months of the year, Eurofer calculated that overall imports of carbon steel finished products this year could reach approximately 21 million tonnes, the lowest level since 2014.