China's Ministry of Commerce on September 1 put an end to the exemption of anti-dumping and anti-subsidization tariffs on polysilicon imports from Europe-, US- and South Korea-based makers via export processing zones (EPZs), and this is expected to increase prices for such material and in turn production costs for China-based PV firms, according to industry sources in Taiwan.
Since China-based PV module makers have a combined global market share of about 70%, their price hikes to reflect increased production costs will push solar cell and PV module makers in other countries to follow suit, the sources said.
Some China-based importers imported polysilicon through EPZs to evade the punitive tariffs imposed by the ministry in 2013.
To block the tax evasion, the ministry banned polysilicon imports via EPZs beginning September 2014 but exempted importers with EPZ licenses.
As the exemption expired on August 31, 2015, polysilicon imports via EPZs now have to pay the anti-dumping and anti-subsidization tariffs.
