The Legal Procedure And Significance Of Antidumping Review Of EU Footwear

In October 6th of 2006, the European Union issued an official announcement that the leather shoes originating in China were levied for two years.

The anti-dumping measures will expire in October 6th this year.

According to the European Union's anti-dumping law, the European Union producers may submit a "sunset review" application 3 months before the expiration date (i.e. July 7th), and the European Commission will accordingly examine whether to maintain or cancel the original anti-dumping measures.

In May 1, 2008, the European Union issued an official announcement that it decided on the leather shoes anti circumvention investigation initiated by the European Commission in September 6, 2007 and decided that the Chinese leather shoes products pported or assembled from the Macao area were evasive. The original anti-dumping measure, that is, 16.5% of the anti-dumping duty, will be extended to the leather shoes exported to the European Union from Macao.

That is to say, the EU has been closely monitoring the leather shoes exported by China.

When the anti-dumping measures for leather shoes are about to expire, the EU still applies the expansion of anti-dumping measures to leather shoes. It is obvious that sunset review after two years is hard to avoid.

Two, according to reports from relevant media in Italy, the chairman of the Federation of Italy footwear industries has announced that, in view of the imminent expiration of EU anti-dumping measures against Chinese and Vietnamese leather shoes, Italy will ask the EU to extend the anti-dumping period.

For enterprises, it is necessary to prepare for review in advance.

The so-called review is the continuation of the original investigation procedure. To a large extent, the review procedure is the same as the original investigation procedure.

For the prosecution, the review can be used to further crack down on products that have been imposed anti-dumping duties, making it difficult for Chinese products to enter the EU market.

For Chinese enterprises, it is entirely possible to go back to the European market again through anti-dumping review.

Therefore, in the face of reexamination, our enterprises should choose to unite and take the initiative to break through rather than passive.

There are three kinds of EU anti-dumping review: the first is sunset review; the second is the period review; the third is the new exporter review.

Here are three brief reviews.

In accordance with the European Union's legal procedures, the duration of the implementation of anti-dumping measures shall not exceed 5 years. When the domestic industry or investigation authorities of the importing countries do not require further investigation, the measures shall be automatically cancelled.

If the domestic industry of the importing country applies for the investigation, or the investigation authorities believe that it is necessary to conduct an investigation, the measure will enter "final review", commonly known as "sunset review".

According to the provisions of the eleventh and third provisions of the European Union's anti-dumping law, it is judged that the standard of sunset is the possibility of the renewal or recurrence of dumping and damage caused by the measures due.

That is to say, after the ruling of reexamination, the termination of anti-dumping duties may result in the recurrence or recurrence of dumping and damage, and the measures will continue to extend.

Therefore, we can see that the focus of sunset review is on the renewal or recurrence of dumping and damage.

How to determine whether there is "renewal" is generally based on the calculation of the dumping margin of the review period.

How to judge whether there is a "recurrence", generally consider the factors such as "capacity utilization", "inventory", "internal sales", "other market prices and quantities" in exporting countries.

The judgment of the renewal and recurrence of dumping and damage is a link. The European Commission will first examine whether there is any renewal. That is to say, according to the data of the retrial date, whether the enterprises will continue to have dumping margins and whether they will continue to dump leather shoes products to the EU, once the renewal is not found, the focus of the investigation will focus on re issuance.

The re issuance means that during the implementation of the original investigation measures, because the investigation measures are in place, the number of enterprises that may export to the EU will decline, the price will be raised because of the anti-dumping duty, so it will not cause damage to the European Union industry temporarily. But once the anti-dumping measures are lifted, will China export a lot of shoes to Europe? Will the price be reduced again?

This is a factor in the EU's judgement.

It can be seen that the EU has great discretion in judging the recurrence, because this is an estimate of the future situation.

For sunset review, he has only two results.

One is to revoke the original anti-dumping measures, one is to maintain anti-dumping measures, and the other is not to adjust the anti-dumping duty rate.

That is to say, sunset review is in the face of the whole industry.

The result is that the anti-dumping duty rate of the whole industry is abolished, and the tax rate is zero or 16.5% of the anti-dumping duty. It is impossible for one or two enterprises to reduce or raise the anti-dumping duty through sunset review.

From the above analysis, we can see that the sunset review has the following limitations.

First of all, whether or not to initiate the sunset review initiative in the EU industry or the European Commission is not the right decision for Chinese enterprises.

Secondly, the EC has a certain degree of flexibility and discretion in deducing the possibility of "renewal or recurrence". Therefore, their decisions are largely based on their own data analysis and judgment. Chinese enterprises responding to the complaint can not make requests for "market economy status" or "separate award treatment" in the sunset review procedure, nor can they change their tax rates.

From the above analysis, we can see that the possibility of two years' sunset is very small, so enterprises should make preparations for reexamination.

During the period of review, the term "review" refers to the request for reexamination made by the parties concerned in respect of the necessity and effectiveness of the measures in the implementation of the anti-dumping measures.

The review has the following characteristics.

First of all, compared with the sunset review, the review is conducted by the investigating authorities and any involved parties. That is to say, Chinese exporters can initiate the review during the period.

There are partial reexamination and full review of the scope of the review.

That is to say, an enterprise can make a review of the dumping margin, or make a review of the extent of the damage, or carry out a comprehensive review.

Usually, enterprises make more suggestions on dumping review, because dumping review is carried out for a single enterprise. Enterprises can often get a lower tax rate than their competitors through dumping review.

Review can be conducted on individual enterprises or all enterprises.

If the Chinese enterprise independently mentioned, it often involves the enterprise. If it is mentioned by the European Commission or the European Union manufacturer, it will involve the leather shoes industry in China.

The review of the period does not mean that the European Union will file a case for reexamination.

The enterprise's review requirements must satisfy the following two conditions.

The first is the existence of "change of circumstances". The second is that "change of circumstances" is persistent.

This "change of circumstances" refers to the improvement of export prices, or the reduction of domestic prices and costs. The trend and change of data must be representative and sustainable.

During the period, there are three kinds of retrial results. The first is to abolish the original anti-dumping duty, that is, the anti-dumping duty will be zero; the other is to maintain its anti-dumping duty, that is, the period of review has not reached any result; another best result is the adjustment of the anti-dumping duty rate.

The review of the period initiated by the enterprise usually does not increase the dumping margin of the enterprise, because the enterprise must first check it and the lawyer checks it again, so the possibility of raising the dumping margin is not very large, usually reducing the dumping margin of the enterprise.

The main points for reviewing the review period are three words, the first is data, the second is documentary evidence, and third is time.

First, enterprises must collate their own data, collate the data of export, domestic sales and cost in the past year to prove the existence of "change of situation" and its sustainability.

Second, enterprises must prove the five standards that satisfy the market economy status by sorting out written documents and accounts.

For enterprises, whether they can meet the market economy status directly determines the dumping margin of enterprises.

In the process of the original trial, Jin shoe industry has obtained 9.7% lower dumping margin relative to other enterprises because of the market economic status.

Market economy status is a very important breakthrough point for Chinese enterprises to sue EU for anti-dumping.

As we all know, the EU regards China as a non market economy country or a market economy country in pition, so it does not give the treatment of market economy status.

But for individual enterprises, they can apply for their own criteria of market economy status in the original trial or review.

Therefore, enterprises should strengthen the market economy status in this aspect. We should strengthen the strength of all documents, including articles of association, amendments to the articles of association, contracts and resolutions of the board of directors.

Whether the European Commission will maintain the measures of the original investigation depends on the position of the footwear industry in Italy on the one hand; second depends on the attitude of the member states; and the third is the defense of the Chinese enterprises.

If a Chinese company has the same number of enterprises as the original trial, it will restrict the investigation of the European Commission and make its discretion relatively small.

If a Chinese company has few complaints, then the European Commission will apply its BIA, that is, the best information it can obtain is often the information provided by the prosecution.

During the period of review and sunset review, whether the initiative to initiate sunset review is in the European side and not in the Chinese side; whether or not the initiative to review is initiated in the European Union and the Chinese side.

Therefore, Chinese enterprises can achieve the result of changing the anti-dumping duty rate through the review of the period, the review of the merger period and the sunset review.

The new exporter reviews the new exporter's review as the name suggests is a review of the new exporter.

Because some enterprises did not export leather shoes to the EU during the original investigation, or they were not established during the original investigation period.

Therefore, it can be argued that the damage done to the EU industry in the process of the original investigation is not related to our enterprises and requires the EU to reconsider the enterprises individually.

According to the EU anti-dumping law, enterprises have the right to carry out such review.

We are talking about some problems that should be paid attention to in the process of anti-dumping, but anti-dumping and countervailing are also inseparable.

In Europe and the United States, it is generally believed that dumping of Chinese enterprises is not entirely due to the low price or labor force. One of the main reasons is the series of subsidy measures of "state" and / or "local government".

In the past two years, the United States and Canada's anti-dumping cases against China were all heard together with the case of merger and countervailing.

Like Canada's recent anti-dumping case against welded pipes and oil sleeves in China, it is also an anti-dumping investigation and countervailing investigation.

The merger will eventually impose an anti-dumping duty and a countervailing duty.

The EU's Countervailing efforts are also being made, but so far, the EU has not conducted separate countervailing investigations against China.

It only refers to the question of countervailing in the questionnaire of anti-dumping investigation.

What categories of subsidies are specifically designed?

The first is the encouragement policy of the special economic zone.

For example, some enterprises are in an industrial park or in a development area. Enterprises may get cheaper prices or lower tax rates in such areas, and the second is government funding. For example, some enterprises can reward you for three hundred thousand or six hundred thousand because they meet certain conditions. These will appear in the subsidized income of enterprises.

The third category is preferential loans, which stipulates that the interest rate of commercial banks' loans to enterprises should not be lower than 10% of the loan rate announced by the PBC during the same period. If the enterprises get a lower loan interest rate, it will be considered a preferential loan as well as a subsidy if it is lower than 10%.

The largest number of enterprises still get tax concessions. Before 2008, foreign invested enterprises enjoy two exemption and three halves of preferential measures. Enterprises in coastal areas will also enjoy a half or 15% preferential tax rate. These are all plastic subsidies for countervailing measures.

Therefore, enterprises should prepare for these subsidies in advance.

We hope that enterprises can recapture or further expand their share in the EU market through the anti-dumping review investigation, so as to achieve the "market reshuffle" effect.