Tariffs on American steel imports - bush's game with fire

摘要

The decision by President Bush to levy tariffs of up to 30 % on certain steel imports from March 2002 could lead to a worldwide conflagration. Many countries would already like to use the Bush decision as a pretext for also repelling steel imports, as far as possible, through high tariffs starting from the first tonne on-wards. Then President Bush's playing with fire would lead to an uncontrollable conflagration, and everyone would lose. As a reaction, the European Commission issued preliminary tariff rate quotas a few days after the American safeguard duties took effect, to prevent deliveries being diverted to the EU steel market. These safeguard measures only apply tariffs after a certain quota amount, based on traditional import volumes, has been exceeded. In addition, the European Commission opened official consultations with the USA immediately after the Bush decision. This is the first step towards legal action against the American tariffs before the World Trade Or-ganisation (WTO). In the opinion of all the USA's trading partners this complaint appears to have good chances, but will take approximately one and a half years.