The European Union imposed five-year tariffs on steel pipes from China to help EU producers including Salzgitter AG compete with cheaper imports.

The duties as high as 71.9 percent punish Chinese exporters such as Changshu Walsin Specialty Steel Co. for selling stainless-steel seamless pipes and tubes in the EU below cost, a practice known as dumping. The oil, natural-gas, electricity, chemical, construction and waste-incineration industries use the pipes and tubes.

European manufacturers including Germany's Salzgitter Mannesmann Stainless Tubes have suffered "material injury" as a result of dumped imports from China, trade ministers from the 27-nation EU said in a decision today in Geneva. The five-year levies follow provisional anti-dumping duties introduced in June at almost the same rates and will take effect after publication in the EU Official Journal by Dec. 29.

Chinese exporters expanded their combined share of the EU market for stainless-steel seamless pipes and tubes to 18.4 percent in the 12 months through June 2010 from 10.5 percent in 2006, according to the bloc.

The duties are the outcome of an inquiry that the EU opened in September 2010 after a dumping complaint against China by an industry group on behalf of producers that account for more than half of the EU's output of the pipes and tubes. The five-year levies will range from 48.3 percent to 71.9 percent, depending on the Chinese manufacturer. The provisional duties range from 48 percent to 71.5 percent.