CBP recently issued a final affirmative evasion finding in its Enforce and Protect Act investigation on New Orleans-based Musa Stone Import's and King’s Marble & Granite's alleged evasion of antidumping and countervailing duties stemming from transshipping Chinese-origin quartz surface products through Thailand and the Philippines.
International Trade Today is providing readers with the top stories from last week in case they were missed. All articles can be found by searching on the titles or by clicking on the hyperlinked reference number.
Sayari analysts, who say their company crunches 600 million shipment records, say that the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act has had more impact than British, German, Swiss, Canadian and French laws aimed at removing human rights abuses from supply chains.
Shein audits in 2023 uncovered two contract manufacturers that were hiring children 15 years old or younger in China, the company reported, and the companies let those workers go, paid their outstanding wages, and facilitated a return to their parents or legal guardians. "SHEIN also ensured the contract manufacturers strengthened their processes for screening new hires, such as checking and maintaining records of all employees’ IDs. Following appropriate remediation, the contract manufacturers were permitted to resume business," the report said.
The Canada Industrial Relations Board (CIRB) has ordered the two major Canadian freight railways and the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference (TCRC) to undergo binding arbitration over a new labor agreement that would replace the old one that expired in December 2023. A meeting of parties is to take place later this week.
Canada will soon impose a 100% import tariff on all Chinese-made electric vehicles and a 25% tariff on certain Chinese steel and aluminum products, moves that will protect its auto industry from what it said are Beijing’s “unfair, non-market policies and practices.”
The Commerce Department published notices in the Federal Register Aug. 26 on the following AD/CV duty proceedings (any notices that announce changes to AD/CV duty rates, scope, affected firms or effective dates will be detailed in another ITT article):
The Commerce Department is amending final results of the countervailing duty administrative review on narrow woven ribbons with woven selvedge from China (C-570-953) originally published July 28, 2021, to align with the final decision in a court case that challenged a rate in those results.
The Commerce Department is issuing antidumping and countervailing duty orders on pea protein from China (A-570-154/C-570-155). The orders, published Aug. 26, set permanent antidumping and countervailing duties, which will remain in place unless revoked by Commerce in a sunset or changed circumstances review. Commerce will now begin conducting annual administrative reviews, if requested, to determine final assessments of AD/CVD on importers and make changes to cash deposit rates.
Imports of unthreaded pins of alloy steel rod from China subsequently processed into steel threaded rod in the U.S. are circumventing antidumping and countervailing duty orders on steel threaded rod from China (A-570-104/C-570-105), and will remain subject to retroactive suspension of liquidation and antidumping and countervailing duty cash deposit requirements, Commerce said in the final determination of its anti-circumvention inquiry, released Aug. 26.