U.S. Exempts Some Japanese, Other Products from Steel Tariffs

June 21, 2018

Washington- The United States has granted exemptions to some products from Japan and four other countries from its additional tariffs on steel imports, the Commerce Department said Wednesday.

The department approved 42 exclusion requests from seven companies in the United States that import steel products from Japan, China, Germany, Belgium and Sweden.

The requests from four of the seven firms involve Japanese products. The four include Nachi America Inc., a U.S. unit of Japanese machine tool maker Nachi-Fujikoshi Corp., and U.S. razor maker Schick Manufacturing Inc.

"Exclusions generally are granted if there is no domestic availability and there are no overriding national security concerns," the department said in a statement.

The department rejected 56 exclusion requests from 11 different companies.

"This first set of exclusions confirm what we have said from the beginning--that we are taking a balanced approach that accounts for the needs of downstream industries while also recognizing the threatened impairment of our national security caused by imports," Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said.

The department plans to make additional decisions on requests for steel and aluminum tariff exclusions. Requests for exclusions have topped 20,000 in number.

In late March, the United States imposed additional tariffs of 25 pct on steel and 10 pct on aluminum imported from many trade partners, including Japan and China.

The tariffs are based on Section 232 of the 1962 U.S. Trade Expansion Act, which allows safeguards on national security grounds. The European Union, Canada and Mexico were added to the target list earlier this month. Jiji Press