The government on Monday announced cutting of import duties on a number of steel items so as to provide relief to Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME), which have been hit hard by the high cost of raw materials.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in her Budget speech for 2021-22 said the anti-dumping duty and countervailing duty have also been cancelled on certain steel products.
''MSMEs and other user industries have been hard hit by a recent sharp rise in iron and steel prices. Hence, we are reducing customs duty uniformly to 7.5% on semis, flat, and long products of non-alloy, alloy, and stainless steels.
''To provide relief to metal re-cyclers, mostly MSMEs, I am exempting duty on steel scrap for a period up to 31st March 2022. I am also revoking ADD and CVD on certain steel products. Further, to provide relief to copper re-cyclers, I am reducing duty on copper scrap from 5 % to 2.5 %,'' she said.
The minister also announced increasing duty on steel screws and plastic builder wares from 10 % to 15 %. The existing duty on primary/semi-finished products of non-alloy steel, long products of non-alloy, stainless and alloy steel is 10 %, while on flat products of non-alloy and alloy-steel the duty ranges between 10 % to 12.5 %. The duty on all these items has been lowered to 7.5 %.
The 2.5 % duty on iron and steel melting scrap, including stainless steel scrap, and raw materials used in the manufacture of CRGO (Cold Rolled Grain Oriented) steel has been lowered to nil in the Budget.
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