17 September 2026 – Despite a 50 per cent tariff, EUROFER and Europe’s stainless steel producers are demanding another five years of anti dumping duties on cold rolled material from Asia. Yet the same producers have been importing slabs from there in massive quantities for years. The double standard is systemic, and open resistance to this unfair distortion of competition remains far too weak.
Tariffs for Others, Stainless Slabs for Themselves
It is worth letting this sink in. The EU has just sealed off its steel market with a new regime. Duty free quotas are being cut by almost half, and anyone supplying above the quota pays a 50 per cent tariff. That is still not enough for the European stainless steel industry.
EUROFER, acting on behalf of the four European stainless steel producers, has requested two expiry reviews. The anti dumping duties on cold rolled stainless steel from China and Taiwan, as well as from India and Indonesia, are to remain in place for another five years.
The justification is remarkably open: the new steel regime is not enough. Even the 50 per cent tariff is supposedly not sufficient to deter imports. Protection on top of protection. Tariff on top of tariff. And the Commission willingly acts as the enforcer.
The Stainless Steel Slab Paradox
It becomes particularly revealing when one looks at the reasoning. Page after page, the applicants complain that producers in Taiwan and India process cheap, distorted stainless steel slabs from Indonesia. At the same time, they praise the European model of short, scrap based circular supply chains.
What they fail to mention is that the complainant producers themselves have been importing hundreds of thousands of tonnes of stainless steel slabs under heading 7218 for years. What counts as market distortion when a competitor does it apparently becomes smart procurement when it happens in their own mills.
Gerber Group has repeatedly criticised this double standard
The Gerber Group has repeatedly criticised this double standard in the strongest possible terms, most recently in the proceeding concerning hot rolled stainless steel flat products. So far, nothing has changed. The input material may cross the border cheaply. The finished product may not. The price is paid by processors, engineering companies and distributors, who are forced to compete against companies outside Europe using overpriced sheet produced in Europe.
Where Are the Stainless Steel Importer Associations?
The real problem lies elsewhere. In both proceedings, only the European steelworks, EUROFER and the Gerber Group have so far registered as interested parties. There is no sign whatsoever of the associations representing importers, the distributing sector and the processing downstream industry. Yet it is their role to represent the interests of those businesses that import and process stainless steel, thereby safeguarding jobs in Europe. Even in the ongoing stainless steel hot-rolled proceedings, the importers’ associations have been conspicuous by their absence.
The Commission has already called on importers and users to be included in the sample, and the deadlines are approaching. Any association that remains silent leaves the Commission with a one-sided picture. It will gratefully accept it.
Hence this appeal to the associations representing importers, the trade sector and the downstream industry: register now as interested parties in proceedings R871 (China, Taiwan) and R872 (India, Indonesia), state your position and provide data. Trade defence is not a law of nature, but a process. And the process is determined by who has a say.
And to the companies: if your trade association is unwilling to take action, or is not willing to do so with the necessary sharpness, please speak to us. The Gerber Group is at the table in both proceedings.
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