December 19, 2014 — SEAFOODNEWS.COM by Michael Ramsingh — A bill proposed before Congress could have wide-ranging affects on antidumping and countervailing trade regulations. This includes the possibility of tightening laws that would impact shrimp and other seafood import tariffs.
The Leveling the Playing Field Act was introduced last week by Democratic Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown. The legislation was proposed as a way to improve the US's ability to crack down on "unfair foreign competition resulting from violations of trade law," a press release from Brown's office said.
"There are encouraging signs of a comeback in American manufacturing, but that progress could be lost if we don’t have strong trade laws to level the playing field,” said Brown. “Foreign companies who don’t play by the rules are actively trying to undermine the effectiveness of our trade laws. This bill would restore strength to our trade laws and ensure that American companies can compete in a fair marketplace.”
According to the proposal, the Act would take several steps to strengthen US antidumping and countervailing duty statutes.
Highlights of the bill include:
–Maintains Commerce’s discretion to use adverse facts available when a mandatory respondent does not cooperate with an investigation and clarifies that the agency is not obligated to determine what a margin would be if the respondent had participated. (From an importers standpoint "adverse facts' is one of the most dangerous tools in an investigation, because it frees the agency from using actual sources in certain cases, and allows them to construct whatever margin scenario will support their conclusions. In the seafood industry, the domestic shrimp lawyers have pushed the DOC to use adverse facts whenever an overseas company fails to understand or comply with an information request.)
–Increases the number of factors and the length of time the ITC should use to evaluate injury or the threat of injury to U.S. producers to ensure a determination is based on a comprehensive assessment of a sector’s situation. (Again, in terms of the shrimp industry, one of the reasons the latest attempt at shrimp counterveiling duties was thrown out two years ago was that the plaintiffs could not prove any injury in the time period under review.)
–Closes the “new shipper” loophole used by companies to circumvent AD/CVD duties; Increases penalties for failure to provide a country of origin certificate for merchandise covered under AD/CVD orders or for falsifying the information on the certificate
–Clarifies that Commerce has the authority to determine whether to include voluntary respondents in an investigation
–Clarifies that Commerce does not have to conduct an additional investigation to prove that disregarded product values used in non-market economy investigations are subsidized or dumped if the record already shows the product values to be distorted
–Clarifies existing statutory provisions used to assess whether a country’s non-market economy status should be maintained.
Brown's proposal is targeted to help manufactures outside of the seafood sector. His office specifically mentions Ohion-based companies Allied Tube in Hebron, Byer Steel in Cincinnati, JMC in Warren, New Page in Miamisburg, and TMK Ipsco in Brookfield.
But the bill was endorsed by the American Shrimp Processors Association (ASPA) as a means to help domestic shrimp producers.
“The Leveling the Playing Field Act will ensure that American companies have the resources necessary to combat unfair foreign trade practices,” said Dr. David Veal, director for the association. “Dumped and subsidized shrimp imports have seized market share, driven down prices and repeatedly thrown our industry into crisis.”
According to Trade Attorney Warren Connelly of the law firm of Akin, Gump, Straus Hauer and Feld, since the bill was introduced with Congress already adjourned it will be introduced next year where it is likely to receive attention.
If approved, the measure could tighten tariff laws for shrimp producers and American seafood importers, making them more susceptible to attack by domestic interests through use of anti-dumping and counterveiling duty laws. Currently domestic headless shell on Gulf shrimp is commanding a nearly $3 premium over imported HLSO white shrimp. Instead of seeing that as a sign of market success, if this bill were to become law it would likely mean another round of shrimp anti-dumping charges from domestic producers.
This story originally appeared on Seafood.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.