Posted on 28 Jun 2014
The US Department of Commerce (DOC) has opened an
investigation into imposing anti-dumping and countervailing duties on steel
nails manufactured in Vietnam.
The DOC announced the probe on June 18, 20 days after it
received a petition lodged by one of the US’s largest steel nail producers
Mid-Continent Steel & Wire, Inc. against companies in Vietnam, Taiwan,
South Korea, Oman, Malaysia, Turkey, and India.
The petition accused 15 major Vietnamese steel nail firms of
exporting to the US at a dumping margin of 115.3 percent, news website Thoi Bao
Kinh Te Saigon (Saigon Tomes) reported.
It also identified a number of government programs that
likely provide unfair subsidies to producers of steel nails in these countries.
The DOC will determine the degree to which those subsidies
unfairly lower prices.
The US imported around $34.7 million (or 39,000 tons) of
steel nails from Vietnam in 2013, according to customs figures, around 17
percent of its overall steel nail imports during the year.
The US International Trade Commission is expected to release
the initial results of its investigation by July 14 at the latest.
Those results will determine
whether Vietnamese nails are injuring or threatening the US domestic
industry.
If the answer is no, the case will be closed for Vietnam.
This is the fifth anti-dumping and countervailing probe the
US has conducted into Vietnam’s industrial products since 2011. The others were
welded carbon-quality steel pipes, stainless steel pressure pipes, PE bags and
steel hangers.
Only the first item was spared duties.
Earlier this year, the US renewed its 116.31 percent
anti-dumping duty on uncovered innerspring units manufactured in Vietnam.
The duty on the mattress components was first imposed on
Vietnam in December of 2008.
The US Department of Commerce is required to remove
anti-dumping or countervailing duty orders after five years, unless the
department and the International Trade Commission votes otherwise.
