Commenting on the antidumping (AD) and countervailing duty (CVD) investigations lately initiated by the US against imports of Chinese steel products, a spokesperson for China's Ministry of Commerce (MOC) has stated that in the context of the financial crisis trade protectionism has been gaining strength in the US with the initiation lately of three AD and CVD investigations on imports of steel products from China. The MOC spokesperson went on to say that the Chinese steel industry is shocked by and very dissatisfied with such moves and that the Chinese government will pay serious attention to this issue. The spokesperson also said that trade protectionism would seriously affect downstream customers of the steel industry, and would thereby be harmful to normal Sino-US trading of steel products.
On June 26, the US Department of Commerce (DOC) announced the initiation of antidumping and countervailing duty investigations on imports of wire decking from China, following the AD and CVD investigations initiated by the US DOC on steel wire strand and steel grating from China on June 17 and June 19 respectively.