In a statement issued yesterday, commerce minister Ramakrishna Hegde said dumping of newsprint in India by Canada, Sweden and United States were hurting indigenous producers. Replying to a question in the Lok Sabha, the minister said the indigenous production of newsprint was only about 400,000 tonnes as against a demand of about 700,000 tonnes. To meet the deficit, actual users of newsprint are allowed to import their requirements on a nominal levy of five per cent.

Industry sources say, low international prices of newsprint coupled with thepoor quality newsprint produced in India, have led users to rely on imports. While locally-produced newsprint costs around Rs 20,000-22,000 per tonne, imported newsprint cost around US $ 400-450 (Rs 17,200-19,500). As a result, domestic manufacturers have been reeling under low price realisations and most of them are resorting to cost-saving measures to tide over the on-going financial crunch. The anti-dumping duty would help domestic manufacturers be on par with cheap imports from Canada and the US and, subsequently, increase sales offtake.

Early this year, the Delhi High Court had issued a notice to the ministry of commerce on a petition seeking imposition of anti-dumping duty on newsprint imported from United States, Canada and Russia. A vacation bench comprising Justice S K Mahajan and Justice Mukul Mudgal issued the notice, returnable by July 27, on the petition filed by the Indian Newsprint Manufacturers Association (INMA).

The petition alleged that the domestic newsprint manufacturers were passingthrough a crisis due to large-scale dumping of newsprint from USA, Canada and Russia at an exorbitantly low price. The aforesaid situation coupled with the fall in international prices crippled the domestic newsprint industry, resulting in stop-page of production in most of the units and the situation called for immediate corrective measures, the petitioner submitted. Earlier a designated authority of the anti-dumping division had recommended imposition of anti-dumping duty of newsprint imported from these countries, it said.