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Italy 2010 Biodiesel Output Expected to Fall
13.07.2010 10:19 "Agro Perspectiva" (Kyiv) —
Biodiesel output in Italy, Europes third-biggest producer, may plunge 6070 percent this year after falling 50 percent in the first six months of 2010 hit by cheap imports, a top industry official said on Thursday.
«We have a strong fall in production in the first half of this year, of about 50 per cent, because of rapidly growing imports,» said Maria Rosaria Di Somma, director general of the industry body Assocostieri-Unione Produttori Biocarburanti.
«The situation is alarming and, unfortunately, our full-year forecasts are for a bigger (output) fall, of up to 6070 per cent, if the government does not take measures against illegal imports,» Ms Di Somma told Reuters in a telephone interview.
The European Commission, which oversees trade policy for the 27-nation bloc, imposed anti-dumping and anti-subsidy duties for up to five years on imported US biodiesel in May 2009. But European industry has said such duties have being by-passed.
Italian biodiesel makers, who use mostly imported raw materials including palm oil and rapeseed oil, are unable to compete with imported fuel which costs less than their raw materials. Several plants have suspended production, Ms Di Somma said, declining to name those plants.
She did not say where the cheap imports were coming from but previously she has said that such imports came from the United States and Argentina.
Italys 2.5 million tonne biodiesel capacity was heavily underused in 2009, with just 694,000 tonnes produced there, up from 670,449 tonnes in 2008. Imports surged to 465,000 tonnes from 239,887 tonnes in 2008, according to Assocostieri data.
Biodiesel imports are on the rise this year, flooding the Italian market, and Assocostieri has appealed to the government to introduce measures against illegal imports in a new competition legislation being drafted at present, Ms Di Somma said.
Earlier this year, Italian customs seized 10,000 tonnes of biodiesel of uncertain origin which could have been imported illegally.
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