CAFC Overturns CIT Decision, Remands China Ribbons AD Investigation Separate Rate Calculation
The Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit vacated and remanded a lower court decision affirming the non-individual separate rate calculated for Yangzhou Bestpak in the antidumping duty investigation on narrow woven ribbons with woven selvedge from China (A-570-952). The Commerce Department had assigned Yangzhou Bestpak an AD rate based on a simple average of the two mandatory respondents’ AD rates. One of the mandatory respondents had a de minimis AD rate, while the other had been assigned an adverse facts available rate because of noncooperation, which meant Yangzhou Bestpak’s simple average AD rate was half of the AFA rate, despite the company’s cooperation.
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The Court of International Trade had sustained the final determination in April 2012. Despite misgivings with assigning a cooperative respondent a rate that was in large part based on an AFA rate, the lower court said no other evidence was available on the record to assign Yangzhou Bestpak a rate more grounded in commercial reality. CAFC rejected CIT’s reasoning. The record didn’t support Commerce’s simple average AD rate either, so the correct action is to remand the proceeding back to Commerce so it can further investigate or explain, CAFC said.
(Yangzhou Bestpak Gifts v. U.S., CAFC No. 2012-1312, dated 05/20/13)
(Attorneys: Ned Marshak of Grunfeld Desiderio for plaintiff-appellant Yangzhou Bestpak Gifts & Crafts Co., Ltd.; Renee Gerber for defendant-appellee U.S. government; Gregory Dorris of Pepper Hamilton for defendant-appellee Berwick Offray LLC)