India is reluctant getting Bangladeshi jute goods enter into its territory at any cost as its Directorate General of Trade Remedies (DGTR) has ordered an investigation of further duty imposition on import of jute products from Bangladesh.
An IJMA official told Indian media that Indian Jute Mills Association (IJMA) had repeatedly complained about the dumping and illegal import of jute products from Bangladesh.
The DGTR, which is under the Ministry of Commerce and Industry, functions as an integrated single window agency for providing comprehensive and swift trade defence mechanism in India.
The sunset clause is supposed to remain effective till January 2022. That means, unless the Indian government extends the period of the clause, it will help Bangladeshi jute exporters as there will be no safeguard duty from February next year.
“The DGTR has initiated an investigation on the sunset clause of duties imposed by India on jute products exports from Bangladesh after IJMA raised concerns of damage to domestic industry and farmers interests,” IJMA chairman Raghavendra Gupta said.
Since the imposition of anti-dumping duty (ADD) in January 2017 by the Indian government, the quantum of subsidy has been increased by Bangladesh to nullify any hurdle to their trade, he said.
“The jute industry in India was forced to file for circumvention duty when importers began to import sacking cloth instead of sacking bags to evade the ADD,” he said.
Indian authorities had earlier exempted some jute mills in Bangladesh against ADD and countervailing duty through a notification.