US to slap antidumping duty on PH steel exports

A US trade agency has found that certain steel pipes and tubes being used in the oil industry that were imported from the Philippines had been dumped or sold at a lower price in America.

In a notice issued on July 18, the US Department of Commerce’s International Trade Administration (ITA) said that “imports of certain oil country tubular goods from the Republic of the Philippines are being, or likely to be, sold in the United States at less than fair value (LTFV).”

Philippine-based HLD Clark Steel Pipe Co. Inc. was the respondent to the US government’s ongoing dumping and countervailing investigation on oil country tubular goods. Respondents include exporters from India, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey, Ukraine and Vietnam.

According to the ITA, the products exported by HLD Clark had a weighted-average dumping margin of 9.88 percent during the period July 1, 2012 until June 30 of this year.

Since dumping has been finally determined, the Department of Commerce will instruct the US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to continue the suspension of the liquidation of all oil country tubular goods imported from the Philippines that had been entered or withdrawn from warehouse for consumption on or after February 25—the date when the ITA announced a preliminary determination of dumping.

The agency last February said it had found a weighted average dumping margin of 8.9 percent.

Also, the CBP will require Philippine exporters to pay a cash deposit for shipments equal to at least 9.88 percent or the weighted-average amount by which the normal value exceeds the US price, the ITA said.

The ITA added that it had forwarded its final determination on dumping of Philippine oil country tubular goods to the US International Trade Commission (ITC), which in turn is expected to “determine within 45 days whether the domestic industry in the United States is materially injured, or threatened with material injury, by reason of imports or sales (or the likelihood of sales) for importation of the subject merchandise.”

“If the ITC determines that such injury exists, the Department [of Commerce] will issue an antidumping duty order directing CBP to assess, upon further instruction by the Department, antidumping duties on all imports of the subject merchandise entered, or withdrawn from warehouse, for consumption on or after the effective date of the suspension of liquidation,” the ITA noted.