The US Department of Commerce (DOC) announced that it started reconsidering anti-dumping tariffs imposed on certain frozen warm water shrimps imported from six countries, including Vietnam, according to the Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters and Producers (VASEP).
In addition to Vietnam, Thailand, India, China, Ecuador and Brazil are also the targets of anti-dumping duties, said VASEP Deputy General Secretary Truong Dinh Hoe, adding that the DOC will define the new tax rates after February 28 next year.
The DOC has already listed 860 enterprises from six countries as defendants to be directly questioned and investigated.
Eighty-four of them are Vietnamese seafood exporters, Hoe said. Nevertheless, only 50 Vietnamese enterprises have products exported to the US.
Hoe added that the list provided by DOC included repeated names and names of companies that have never exported shrimp to the US. Hoe said that this would not have any negative impact on the administrative review.
All selected companies will have to answer US DOC’s questions regarding the quantity, prices and value of the consignments imported to the US between July 16, 2004 and January 31, 2006.
April 28 is the deadline DOC has set for all defendants to complete the required documents.
The deputy general secretary said that all selected Vietnamese seafood enterprises have already made full preparations to petition the DOC’s anti-dumping tariff review.
He also stressed that the US review will undoubtedly have a negative impact for both domestic shrimp exporters and producers in the near future.
Hoe said one advantage was that Vietnamese shrimp exporters are more experienced than they were two years ago, when their US rivals first filed a petition against them. However, he noted, domestic exporters still needed to co-ordinate their activities and devise strategies based on a variety of scenarios that could unfold during and after the review.
Hoe assured exporters that VASEP and VNSC would support them during the review by hiring prestigious lawyers to keep them informed of their legal rights and procedures to follow.
Early last month, the US Southern Shrimp Alliance (SSA) asked the DOC to review the anti-dumping tariffs it imposed on Vietnamese shrimp in July 2004, with SSA saying it thought the current rates were too low.
According to the latest DOC announcement, final anti-dumping margins on imports of shrimp for mandatory respondents from Vietnam ranged from 4.5 per cent to 25.6 per cent.
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 USUS$2.6 billion last year.
Labour, Youth
Vietnamese
