Mumbai:
The world's top steel producer and consumer China,
exported a record 43.01-million tonnes of steel in 2006
a 109.6-per cent year-on-year, while imports dropped
28.3 per cent to 18.51-million tonnes, reports the Chinese
customs department.
The
record exports came despite measures by the Chinese government
to cool its heated economy and the anti-dumping investigations
launched by trade partners, according to latest customs
figures.
Exports in December alone rose 19.9 per cent from November
reaching 5.55 million tonnes up 205 per cent from
December 2005.
Monthly
imports declined by 17.5 per cent year-on-year to stand
at 1.51 million tonnes, up 2.3 per cent from a month earlier,
leaving net monthly exports at 4.04 million tonnes, Xinhua
news agency reported.
China's
surging steel exports have invited criticism from US and
European companies on the ground of subsidies being provided
by the Chinese government to its exporters and that the
Chinese currency was being kept deliberately low to encourage
cheap exports. US steel makers twice urged US trade officials
last year to act against China for its alleged subsidies
to its steel manufacturers.
To
ease tensions and to slow the production of energy- and
resource-intensive
products, the government cut the export tax rebate rate
of steel products three times since last year, from 15
to eight per cent, and ended subsidies to steel producers.
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