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| Horticultural & Tropical Products Division | Return to the H&TP Home Page |
October 12, 2001
Commerce Department Will Not Extend Scope of Antidumping Duties on Non-Frozen Chinese Concentrated Apple Juice
On Tuesday, October 2, 2001, the DOC announced that it would not extend antidumping duties to certain non-frozen apple juice concentrate from the People’s Republic of China. The ruling came after the U.S. apple industry requested in April to expand the established antidumping duty order on Chinese non-frozen apple juice concentrate to include semi-frozen apple juice concentrate. On May 15, 2000, the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) issued a final determination that the U.S. apple juice industry has been materially injured by imports of non-frozen concentrated apple juice from China. On the basis of the October 1, 2001, scope ruling, the Commerce Department determined that the "semi-frozen" product, which is shipped and stored at -18 degrees Celsius, is considered "frozen" for classification purposes, and thus does not fall within the scope of the antidumping order on non-frozen apple juice concentrate.
Japan Proposes a Safety Net on Domestic Vegetables
On September 25, 2001, Japan submitted a proposal on the implementation of special safeguards for perishable products to the WTO Special Session of the Committee on Agriculture. The proposal is a new safeguard mechanism for seasonal and perishable agricultural products to provide for "timely and effective" safeguard measures to protect domestic growers from rapidly growing imports from neighboring countries. Details of how the proposal will work are as follows: 1) The new safeguard mechanism will be applied automatically based on a pre-set trigger level for quantity and/or price of imports. It will not require an investigation and determination by the authorities on the increased volume of imports or injury to a domestic industry. The additional duties will be automatically imposed (details not provided); 2) The new safeguard mechanism will cover all unprocessed agricultural products, including frozen products intended for preservation, as well as slightly processed products such as cut products. Dried products will not be covered by this safeguard.
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