AISI Urges Response to Court Decision Limiting Application of CV Duties
12/23/2011 - American Iron and Steel Institute President and CEO Thomas J. Gibson issued a statement regarding a U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruling this week to strike down the U.S. Commerce Department’s application of countervailing duties against subsidized products, including steel, from China.
American Iron and Steel Institute (AISI) President and CEO Thomas J. Gibson issued a statement regarding a U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruling this week to strike down the U.S. Commerce Department’s application of countervailing duties against subsidized products, including steel, from China.
“AISI is gravely concerned with this erroneous court decision, which will cost valuable American jobs at a time when we need to be creating jobs, not eliminating them,” Gibson said in the statement. “It is well documented that the Chinese government is the world’s biggest subsidizer of favored manufacturing industries. This results in unfairly traded exports undercutting U.S. manufacturers, and contributes greatly to our country’s trade deficit with China, which is expected to exceed $294 billion this year. According to one estimate, the U.S. trade deficit with China has cost Americans 2.8 million jobs over the past 10 years.
“With over 20 Chinese products currently subject to countervailing duties (CVD)—duties that were imposed only after a comprehensive investigation—this ruling gives Chinese producers and exporters a license to unfairly attack the U.S. market with the full resources of the Chinese government.
“If left to stand, this ruling will deny the U.S. government a critical WTO-authorized tool to address one of China’s leading trade-distorting practices,” Gibson continued, urging the Obama Administration and Congress “to begin work immediately to enact legislation clarifying that the CVD law continues to apply to non-market economies, like China, where the Department of Commerce determines that it can isolate and measure subsidies. Congress has never passed any legislation prohibiting the application of the CVD law to non-market economies, and the Court’s mistaken conclusion to the contrary must be corrected.”
AISI serves as the voice of the North American steel industry in the public policy arena and advances the case for steel in the marketplace as the preferred material of choice. It also plays a lead role in the development and application of new steels and steelmaking technology. AISI is comprised of 25 member companies, including integrated and electric furnace steelmakers, and 120 associate and affiliate members who are suppliers to or customers of the steel industry.
