During the Aluminum Summit in September, members heard a lot about our Fair Trade case and the tasks in front of us. I wanted to use this opportunity to discuss the key issues and our path forward. From Scope Challenges to the Sunset Review, the next 12 months may be the busiest time ever for our case. The Sunset Review process is upon us. October will feature two webinars for members this year to help you prepare for the case. One for the production and financial piece, and one for the commercial side. While the templates we will fill out haven’t changed much, the climate in which we seek a renewal of orders has. Business is strong for extruders now. From a layman’s point of view, our industry is rock solid. Orders are strong, new equipment has been installed, and records are being set by extruders across the country. However, this environment has brought a significant increase in imports. Currently, imports have a...
The Aluminum Extruders Council (AEC) has led the U.S. aluminum extrusion industry in achieving level competition by winning tariff protection that offsets unfair trade practices of extruders/importers of aluminum profiles produced in China. Our efforts have been of enormous value to domestic extruders and suppliers. Conservatively, an estimated 800 million pounds per year of extrusions are being produced in the U. S. that would have otherwise been lost to China.