An anti-dumping duty is an additional customs duty imposed to counter dumping - where goods are exported to the EU at a price below their normal value (broadly, the price or cost in the exporter's home market) and that causes, or threatens, material injury to EU industry. It is not a tax on the product as such, like the ordinary tariff. It is a corrective measure aimed at a specific product from a specific country, and often a specific exporter.
Anti-dumping duties are the result of an investigation, not a policy choice made overnight:
The rate is frequently company-specific: a cooperating exporter with its own investigated rate pays less than the 'all other companies' rate, which captures everyone else.
An anti-dumping duty sits on top of the ordinary customs duty for the code, and it turns on the origin. To claim a lower company-specific rate, the importer must usually present a valid commercial invoice from the named producer - without it, the higher 'all other companies' rate applies. TARIC shows the anti-dumping measure against the 10-digit code, alongside the normal duty and any other measures.
Because the rates can be high, there is an incentive to dodge them - by routing goods through a third country, or by slightly modifying the product so it falls under a code the measure does not name. The EU responds with anti-circumvention investigations, and can register the suspect imports so that, if circumvention is confirmed, the duty is charged retroactively. A duty-free code today is not a guarantee it will stay that way.
Take hardwood plywood from China - CN 4412 33 90 10 - imported into Ireland. Ask Smart Taric AI what applies, and against the code it lays out the full picture:
Two things stand out. First, the scale: the anti-dumping duty is more than twelve times the tariff, so the classification and the origin evidence carry real money. Second, the moving target: the EU has opened an anti-circumvention investigation (Regulation (EU) 2026/1840) into 'slightly modified' plywood - with thin coniferous or bamboo outer plies added over a hardwood core - declared under duty-free codes to potentialy escape the measure, and has registered those imports for possible retroactive duty.
Smart Taric AI does not decide the classification for you; it reads TARIC and the measure regulations and shows what applies, so you can see both the headline duty and the risk around the edges. Try Smart Taric.
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