‘Denounce and disrupt’ EBB backs US response to ‘illegal’ biodiesel trade

The European Biodiesel Board (EBB) has announced its support of the US’ National Biodiesel Board’s (NBB) anti-dumping and countervailing duty complaints against dumped and subsidised biodiesel imports from Argentina and Indonesia.

NBB reported that the US biodiesel market had suffered severe damage as a result of illegal trade activities which escalated by 464% between 2014 and 2016, taking nearly 20% of the market share from US producers. The NBB is the US equivalent to Europe’s EBB.

Argentinian and Indonesian producers have been exporting biodiesel to the US at prices significantly below the cost of production. The NBB claimed a dumping margin of 23.3 % for Argentina and 34% for Indonesia. The alleged ‘unfair’ trading practices are caused for the most part by the Differential Export Tax in place in both Indonesia and Argentina. These practices have previously been challenged and condemned by the EU and Peru.

The EBB can empathise with the NBB’s situation; the EU’s biodiesel market having faced the same challenge. In November 2013 this led to definitive anti-dumping duties being imposed against biodiesel imported from both Argentina and Indonesia. In a press release the EBB welcomed the NBB duties, saying: “Today, the time has come for the NBB to denounce and disrupt the illegal trade patterns.”

Raffaello Garofalo, Secretary General of the European Biodiesel Board, said in the EBB press release: “We welcome NBB action and are confident about the success of the freshly lodged complaints. After Peruvians did the same few months ago, the US market’s recourse to a legal solution clearly shows that the unfair trade imbalances caused by the Argentineans and Indonesian producers are impossible to cope with and pose a severe threat to the global biodiesel market’s level playing field.

“Most importantly, we hope that the news will also send a strong signal to EU authorities about the undeniably legitimate character of the EU trade defence measures in place for biodiesel against Indonesia and Argentina.”