CIT Affirms Lower CV Duties on China Aluminum Extrusions From Zhongya; May Drop Cash Deposit Rate
The countervailing duty rate for aluminum extrusions from China (C-570-968) exported by Zhaoqing New Zhongya Aluminum is set to fall to 4.89%, after the Court of International Trade on Feb. 19 affirmed the Commerce Department’s recalculation of the company’s original investigation rate. Zhongya had been assigned a CV duty rate of 8.02% in 2011 (see 11052633), but CIT later took issue with the way Commerce valued land subsidies and remanded for Commerce to revisit the issue (see 13071901. Commerce didn’t set a new rate for Zhongya in the only CV duty administrative review completed since the original investigation (see 13123123), so the new 4.89% CV duty rate appears to apply to CV duty cash deposits on future entries as well.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
If your job depends on informed compliance, you need International Trade Today. Delivered every business day and available any time online, only International Trade Today helps you stay current on the increasingly complex international trade regulatory environment.
The CIT remand centered on the way Commerce valued land provided to Zhongya by other Chinese companies that were associated with the government. The land was allegedly provided at below-market prices, so Commerce considered it a subsidy. Given China’s non-market economy status and Commerce’s purported inability to trust Chinese prices, the agency valued the land using third-country market prices from Thailand. However, CIT took issue with the agency’s decision to compare the undeveloped Chinese land provided to Zhongya with prices for fully-developed land in a Thai industrial park. On remand, Commerce instead used land prices from a more undeveloped region in the Philippines, which caused Zhongya’s CV duty rate to fall to 4.89%.
(Zhaoqing New Zhongya Aluminum Co. v. United States, Slip Op. 14-19, dated 02/19/14, Judge Pogue)