US Admits Unfair Calculation in Shrimp Anti-Dumping Case

By abandoning the practice of “zeroing” in the shrimp anti-dumping case against foreign countries including Vietnam, the US Department of Commerce (DOC) is admitting it is in the wrong and that it has used unfair methodology, according to the Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters and Producers (VASEP).

 

“Through its use of "zeroing", the U.S has failed to make a fair comparison between the export price and the normal value, and has calculated distorted margins of dumping in the preliminary determination,” VASEP said.

 

The association also added that without applying the illegal zeroing methodology, nearly all of the dumping margins found by DOC in the shrimp case would disappear.

 

The removal of the practice which has been ruled illegal by the WTO will give favorable opportunities to lawyers defending Vietnamese shrimp exporters to devise strategies in fighting the lawsuit.

 

All 54 Vietnamese companies that exported shrimp to the US from July of 2004 to January of 2005 have recently submitted applications to the US Department of Commerce (DOC) to reconsider anti-dumping tariffs on their shipments.

 

Shrimp is the largest export earner for Vietnam's seafood industry, accounting for more than half of Vietnam's total seafood export revenues, which totaled US$2.6 billion last year. In 2004, about 300,000 tons of shrimp was sold abroad to 80 countries and territories.

 

The Government Statistics Office reported that the country was estimated to have fetched up to nearly US$329 million from seafood exports in the first two months of this year, up only 3.3% against the same period last year.

 

This year, Vietnam is expected to gain US$2.8 billion from seafood shipments and US$4 billion by 2010.