The Commerce Department will not suspend liquidation and impose cash deposit requirements on imports of frozen warmwater shrimp from Ecuador (C-331-803), after finding no countervailable subsidization in its preliminary CV duty determination. The agency calculated de minimis CV duty rates for both respondents, Promarisco and Sociedad Nacional de Galapagos. Commerce will revisit the issue when it issues its final determination, and may at that point suspend liquidation and impose CV duty cash deposit requirements if it finds subsidization. The final determination is currently due 75 days from the date of this preliminary determination.
The Commerce Department will not suspend liquidation and impose cash deposit requirements on imports of frozen warmwater shrimp from Indonesia (C-560-825), after finding no countervailable subsidization in its preliminary CV duty determination. The agency calculated de minimis CV duty rates for all respondents. Commerce will revisit the issue when it issues its final determination, and may at that point suspend liquidation and impose CV duty cash deposit requirements if it finds subsidization. The final determination is currently due 75 days from the date of this preliminary determination.
A countervailing duty cash deposit requirement will take effect June 4 for imports of frozen warmwater shrimp from Thailand (C-549-828), after the Commerce Department found illegal subsidization of Thai producers in its preliminary determination. The agency assigned a CV duty cash deposit rates of 2.09 percent to most Thai producers. Marine Gold will not be subject to suspension of liquidation and cash deposits requirements because Commerce calculated a de minimis CV duty rate for the company. Thai frozen shrimp has been subject to antidumping duties since 2005.
With ongoing negotiations for the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) between the U.S. and the European Union (EU), multiple business federations and lobbying groups have stepped forward to push new efforts towards trade facilitation.
The Commerce Department will collect countervailing duties on frozen warmwater shrimp from China, India, Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam, but will leave alone shrimp imports from Ecuador and Indonesia as a result of negative subsidy determinations, it said in a fact sheet. In its preliminary determinations, announced May 29, the agency found CV rates of 5.76 percent for Chinese companies; 5.72 to 6.1 percent for Indian companies; 10.8 to 62.74 for Malaysian companies; de minimis to 2.09 percent for Thai companies; and 5.08 to 7.05 percent for Vietnamese companies. The final determinations in these countervailing duty investigations are due in August.
International Trade Today is providing readers with some of the top stories for May 20-24 in case they were missed.
The Court of International Trade sustained the Commerce Department’s decision to end an antidumping new shipper review for a Chinese company because of a single sale of subject merchandise produced by a manufacturer subject to the original investigation. Pujiang Talent Diamond Tools challenged the agency’s rescission of a new shipper review of diamond sawblades from China (A-570-900), arguing that, despite such a requirement in Commerce’s regulations, rescinding on the basis of a single sale went too far. But the court found that a decision by Commerce to go against its own regulations and not rescind wasn’t a choice the agency could make.
Industry representatives commended the Senate customs reauthorization bill in its first formal hearing May 22, and said the bill’s provisions on intellectual property rights, the Automated Commercial Environment, the International Trade Data System and de minimis will go a long way towards facilitating trade. The bill -- S-662, the Trade Facilitation and Trade Enforcement Act -- was introduced by Senate Finance Committee leaders Max Baucus, D-Mont., and Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, in March (see 13032906 for more on specific provisions in the bill).
The Bureau of Industry and Security will hold a webinar May 29 at 2:30 p.m. on certain provisions of the final rules on initial implementation of export control reform. The webinar will take the place of the normal Wednesday teleconference held by Assistant Secretary Kevin Wolf. Topics will include new provisions with respect to de minimis and the foreign direct product rule under the Export Administration Regulations, which will become effective October 15, 2013. BIS is charging $35 for the webinar. Register (here).
Customs reauthorization legislation - an actual, tangible bill - is necessary to help shift CBP's focus back to trade facilitation and codify progress the agency has already made, Senators and industry representatives said at a May 22 hearing on S-662, the customs bill introduced by Finance Committee leaders in March. "The real question is how we reinvigorate this commitment to the trade side of CBP," said Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., at the Finance Committee hearing. Senators have tried politely asking CBP to do this, through letters and in hearings, but "that hasn't worked," Wyden said. "That's why we felt we needed to have an actual piece of legislation."