UPDATE 1-US sets preliminary duties on China steel wire good

WASHINGTON, Nov 3 - The United States said on Tuesday it has set preliminary duties ranging from 2 percent to 438 percent on hundreds of millions of dollars of imported steel wire decking from China to offset government subsidies.

It was the latest in a growing list of actions against imports from China, the United States' second largest trading partner.

Since January, the Commerce Department has launched at least one dozen investigations into charges that Chinese companies "dump" goods in the United States at unfairly low prices or receive government subsidies that allow them to sell more cheaply than U.S. competitors.

The preliminary decision concerns a product, welded-wire rack decking, used in industrial and other commercial storage rack systems.

U.S. companies imported an estimated $317 million of the good in 2008, an increase of 49 percent from 2006.

The Commerce Department said it set countervailing duty rates of 2.02 percent for Dalian Huameilong Metal Products Co and 3.13 for Dalian Eastfound Metal Products, which both cooperated in its investigation.

But a significant number of Chinese companies did not complete the U.S. government's questionnaire and those companies were given an adverse countervailing duty rate of 437.37 percent "for non-responsiveness," the department said.