The European Commission has begun an interim review of anti-dumping duties imposed against Russian ammonium nitrate.
The review was initiated by eight bodies representing farmers from Ireland, Spain, Britain, France, Italy and Finland, the biggest ammonium nitrate consumers, the EC said in materials.
The farmers say that the market situation has changed since safeguard duties were imposed back in 2002: European fertilizer producers have consolidated, and have been spending less on gas, which is used to produce AN. They argue that existing duties imposed on Russian AN to support local farmers are no longer justifiable.
The review will assess damages inflicted by these duties in the period July 1, 2016 to June 30, 2017 and will take 15 months.
Simultaneously, the EC has begun to review anti-dumping duties against AN supplied by Russia’s Acron Group at the group’s request. Duties effective from July 1, 2016 until June 30, 2017 are under review. In its request, Acron says its own fertilizer sales mix in Europe has altered and that gas prices in Russia have gone up.
The EU in 2014 extended anti-dumping measure against Russian AN by five years. The duties for Russia’s EuroChem are between 28.88 and 32.82 euros per tonne, depending on the type of fertilizer; the duty for the UralChem group’s KCKK Branch is 47.07 euros per tonne; and duties for other producers are 41.42-47.07 euros a tonne, depending on type of fertilizer.
