Industry welcomes anti-dumping duty on SMOF imports

The Finance Ministry has imposed a definitive anti-dumping duty on certain optical fibre imports from China, South Korea and Indonesia to give some relief to the domestic optical fibre industry reeling under the adverse impact of low-price and low-quality imports.

Ankit Agarwal, MD, STL said this is a positive step. He said, “The decision to impose anti-dumping duty on single mode optical fibre imports from China, Korea, and Indonesia is a strategic move that will unlock the growth potential of the indigenous optical fibre industry. OpticalfFibre is a hi-tech product and it is absolutely critical for India’s digital ambitions. Low-price, low-quality fibre coming into India through these countries can impact the longevity and quality of India’s 5G and rural broadband network and can potentially wash off nearly 10 years of the fibre’s lifetime!

The prescribed anti-dumping measures will be an effective deterrent to such activities and will go a long way in ensuring a future-ready, high-quality network build for India. These measures outlined by the Ministry of Finance not only strengthen the Indian Optical industry but also pave the way for India to become a global leader in Optical Fibre, taking PM Modi’s Digital and Atmanirbhar India vision to greater heights.

With this decisive action by the Ministry of Finance, we expect to witness positive changes in the domestic Optical Fibre market dynamics and an overall enhancement of the domestic industry’s growth prospects. We sincerely express our gratitude to the Ministry of Finance and the DGTR for their unwavering dedication and impartial assessment, leading to this well-considered decision.”

Backgrounder
Based on the recommendations of the Directorate General of Trade Remedies (DGTR), the revenue department has imposed an anti-dumping duty on dispersion unshifted Single-Mode Optical Fiber (SMOF) imports from China, South Korea and Indonesia. The anti-dumping duty ranges from $122 per kfkm to $857.23 per kfkm, with the commodity being traded in fkm (fibre kilometres).

This definitive anti-dumping duty will be valid for five years.

Major consumption of SMOF is driven by 3G/4G/5G rollout by telecom companies, connectivity of gram panchayat and defence. SMOF facilitates transmission of a single-spatial mode of light as a carrier and is used for signal transmissions within certain bands. It is used for manufacture of optical fibre cables, including unit-tube and multi-tube stranded cables, tight buffer cables, armoured and unarmoured cables, ribbon cables and dry core cables.

SMOF is mainly applied to high data rate, long distance and access network transportation, therefore is mainly used in long haul, metro area network, CATV, optical access network and even over short distance network as applicable.

On behalf of the domestic industry, Birla Furukawa Fiber Optics Pvt Ltd had filed the petition seeking anti-dumping probe on SMOF imports from China, South Korea and Indonesia. The petition was supported by Sterlite India Technologies and Corning India Technologies. The three producers cumulatively account for ninety percent of total Indian production of SMOF.

This revenue department move to impose anti-dumping duty on optical fibre comes at a time when India is in the midst of a massive digitisation drive (through rural outreach programme such as BharatNet) and private operators are also bolstering their network for 4G and 5G services.

CT Bureau