TOKYO (Kyodo) -- Japan will examine whether to lift punitive tariff on computer chips made by Hynix Semiconductor Inc. in response to a request from the South Korean company, government officials said Wednesday.
Japan reduced its 27.2 percent countervailing duty on imports of Hynix dynamic random access memory chips to 9.1 percent on Sept. 1 following a recommendation from the World Trade Organization.
Japan has been imposing countervailing duty on the chips since January 2006, claiming that the South Korean government effectively subsidized Hynix to enable it to set unfairly low prices in the Japanese market.
In late September, Hynix, the world's second-largest maker of DRAMs, asked the Finance Ministry to scrap the duty as it no longer enjoys the benefits of South Korean government financial support, according to the officials.
The examination will be carried out for up to one year by the Finance Ministry and the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, they said.