Prime Minister Mark Carney in a press conference in Ottawa on Thursday said the government will attempt to limit steel imports from countries that don’t have a free-trade agreement with Canada to 2024 levels.
The Canadian Press
Canada is cracking down on the dumping of cheap foreign steel into the country by imposing new trade restrictions aimed at helping domestic producers reeling from U.S. President Donald Trump’s punishing tariffs.
Prime Minister Mark Carney, in a news conference in Ottawa on Thursday, said the government will attempt to limit steel imports from countries that don’t have free-trade agreements with Canada to 2024 levels.
Canada currently has such agreements with 51 countries, including the United States, Mexico, the European Union, Australia and Japan. But China, India, Taiwan, Turkey and Russia, all major steel producers, do not have trade deals with Canada. They have been accused of selling the metal at an artificially low price to gain market share, a practice known as dumping.
If the group of countries that don’t have free-trade agreements with Canada exceeds 2024 steel shipment volumes, a 50-per-cent tariff will apply.
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This was the first major trade announcement from Mr. Carney’s government since this week’s G7 summit in Kananaskis, Alta, where his office said he and Mr. Trump had agreed to work toward a comprehensive trade and security deal within 30 days.
The anti-dumping measures target a practice that is also an irritant for U.S. producers. Mr. Trump, in justifying a recent executive order that raised steel tariffs, said that foreign producers were still dumping the metal into the U.S. market.
When Mr. Trump first imposed 25-per-cent tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum imports in March, Ottawa responded by imposing across-the-board reciprocal tariffs on imports from the U.S. But Canada subsequently granted a tariff reprieve on some products coming from the U.S., including steel used in manufacturing and processing.
Mr. Carney on Thursday said that Canada plans to adjust countertariffs on U.S. steel and aluminum imports on July 21 to new levels that will depend on how trade talks are going.
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The amount of foreign steel coming into Canada is growing as a consequence of Mr. Trump’s tariffs. Since overseas producers are being largely shut out of the U.S., they are more aggressively competing in other markets such as in Canada.
“One of the consequences” said Mr. Carney of Mr. Trump’s trade war against Canada, “is that steel from other countries, from third countries, starts to come into Canada if we don’t protect our industries.”
The anti-dumping initiatives on countries without free-trade agreements with Canada will “stabilize the domestic market and prevent harmful trade diversion as the result of the U.S. actions,” the federal Finance Ministry said in a press release.
Mr. Trump in early June doubled tariffs on almost all the country’s foreign steel imports to 50 per cent, a level that makes it virtually impossible for Canadian producers to compete in the U.S.
The Canadian Steel Producers Association, which represents 17 companies, including Stelco, pictured, has repeatedly advocated for antidumping duties to ease the impact of U.S. tariffs.COLE BURSTON/AFP/Getty Images
The Canadian Steel Producers Association, which represents 17 companies, including Algoma Steel Group Inc. ASTL-T, ArcelorMittal Dofasco and Stelco, has repeatedly advocated for Ottawa to impose anti-dumping duties to help ease the pain of the U.S. tariffs.
Algoma Steel chief executive Michael Garcia has argued that foreign mills from countries without trade agreements with Canada, such as China, India and Turkey, regularly dump steel into Canada, making it nearly impossible for the company to compete in its home market.
But he’s also flagged producers from South Korea, Malaysia and Vietnam as engaging in dumping. Those countries have free-trade agreements with Canada and won’t be affected by Ottawa’s new trade measures.
The Finance Ministry in its release said that more tariff measures are coming in the next few weeks to address unfair trade practices that will focus on individual countries, which opens the possibility that countries with free trade agreements may be targeted.
Jean Simard, CEO of the Aluminium Association of Canada, in a press release said that the trade action by the government strikes the right balance by “sending a strong signal towards focused and accelerated negotiations and using a measured approach through adaptive counter-tariffs and reciprocal procurement policies.”
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Ottawa on Thursday also said that, effective June 30, it will limit its steel and aluminum purchases for federal infrastructure projects to domestic producers and to foreign countries that provide reciprocal access to Canadian companies − measures that should help create more demand at home.
Early reaction from the steel industry on the trade measures announced by the government wasn’t as enthusiastic.
“It falls short of what our industry needs at this most challenging time,” Catherine Cobden, CEO of the Canadian Steel Producers Association and Marty Warren, national director for Canada, United Steelworkers Union, said in a joint statement.
“We will continue to review the details of the measures and work constructively with the federal government to get a plan that works for Canadian steel producers and the thousands of workers that make up our sector.”
Ontario Premier Doug Ford, who spoke with Mr. Carney on Wednesday, told reporters at Queen’s Park on Thursday that he supports the Prime Minister’s imposition of quotas on some steel imports, as well as adjusting tariffs on U.S. steel imports if a trade deal isn’t struck within 30 days.
“I do have the confidence in the Prime Minister and his team to move forward with these negotiations,” he said, adding that Mr. Carney did a “very, very good job” in dealing with Mr. Trump in a short time frame.
With reports from Nojoud Al Mallees, Laura Stone and Mark Rendell