THE European Union will imposed duties on imports from China of steel bars used to reinforce concrete at rates higher than initially proposed, the EU’s official journal said Friday.

    The bloc has set definitive anti-dumping duties on high performance reinforcement bars (HFP rebars) at between 18.4 and 22.5 percent and will be in place for five years.

    HFP rebars is a specific type of steel produced in several EU member states and used as a standard in Britain and Ireland.

    The investigation into dumping, or selling at unfairly low prices, was begun in April 2015 following a complaint from industry body Eurofer.

    The European Commission had previously imposed duties of between 9.2 and 13.0 percent at the end of January, a level criticized as too low by its steel sector.

    British steel association U.K. Steel has said that China accounted for more than 45 percent of the British rebar market, up from zero four years earlier.

    The Commission has 37 anti-dumping and anti-subsidy measures in place and 15 investigations ongoing into steel products.

    The European Commission’s imposition of heavy anti-dumping duties on Chinese steel bars is “unjustifiable protection for the EU steel industry,” China’s Xinhua news agency reported over the weekend, citing a statement from the Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM).

    The MOFCOM expressed regret that the move came just weeks after a Group of 20 nations meeting in Chengdu, China, where finance ministers had committed to avoid protectionism.

    China’s steel industry, swamped in overcapacity yet a major employer, has struggled to meet capacity reduction targets, and rising prices for steel have encouraged producers to ramp up production for export.

    China’s monthly steel exports rose to the second-highest on record at 10.94 million tons in June, data showed.(SD-Agencies)