World Trade Organization members addressed a "record number of trade concerns" during a Nov. 24-25 meeting of the Council for Trade in Goods, the WTO said. Topics included how the council could implement some of the outcomes of the 12th Ministerial Conference: the work program on electronic commerce, the WTO's response to the COVID-19 pandemic and WTO reform. The committee also wanted to continue talks on the Least-Developed Countries Group's proposal for some countries to graduate from LDC status. The next council meeting is April 3-4.
The U.S. again blocked a proposal to start the selection process to fill seats on the World Trade Organization's Appellate Body, according to a Geneva-based trade official. Striking down the proposal at the Dispute Settlement Body's Nov. 28 meeting, the U.S. said it does not support filling the body's seats, insisting the first step to WTO revisions should be efforts to better understand the concerns of WTO members, the trade official said.
Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., one of the primary movers behind the Chips Act, told an audience that more domains need policymakers' attention so that they don't wake up to find that China has become dominant in an important emerging technology. He noted that before becoming a politician, he "was in the telecommunication space," and said that realizing that China is dominating 5G with two heavily subsidized champion companies was the "final wake-up call" that engagement and deeper trade with China is not the right way to go.
The World Trade Organization published the agenda for the Nov. 28 meeting of the Dispute Settlement Body. It includes U.S. status reports on the implementation of recommendations adopted by the DSB on antidumping measures on certain hot-rolled steel products from Japan; antidumping and countervailing measures on large residential washers from South Korea; certain methodologies and their application to antidumping proceedings involving China; and Section 110(5) of the U.S. Copyright Act. A status report also is expected from Indonesia on measures related to the import of horticultural products, animals and animal products, and from the EU on measures affecting the approval and marketing of biotech products.
South Africa recently began a sunset review of antidumping duties on “frozen bone-in portions of poultry” from the U.S., USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Service said Nov. 16. The South African Poultry Association told the country’s International Trade Administration Commission that expiration of AD on the poultry imports, scheduled for Nov. 23, “would likely lead to the continuation or recurrent of dumping or material injury.” South Africa said the application submitted by the association “has enough prima facie evidence to trigger a sunset review investigation” for the period of Jan. 1, 2021, through Dec. 31, 2021. USDA said U.S. bone-in chicken shipments to South Africa have been subject to AD since 2000.
Of all the outstanding trade policy options -- new trade promotion authority, requiring Section 301 exclusions, revisions to antidumping law and a customs modernization law -- the head of government relations at Flexport said he thinks customs modernization is the most likely to pass. "I think we are coming on the cusp of something," Darien Flowers said, and said he thinks a bill will be enacted before 2025. Flowers once worked for Sen. Bill Cassidy, the Louisiana Republican who is leading the bill, though more recently he served on the minority staff of the Senate Commerce Committee.
The World Trade Organization on Nov. 1 opened the Trade Remedies Data Portal, a tool that will give access to information on WTO members' antidumping and countervailing duty actions, the WTO said. The portal will display the data via searchable tables and customizable graphs, and allow users to filter the data based on certain parameters. The portal has data on AD/CVD actions that led to the application of trade remedy measures in force on or after Jan. 1, 2020, with updates for information prior to 2020 expected next year. The portal was developed in conjuction with the WTO Secretariat's Open Trade Data Initiative.
World Trade Organization members are lagging in submitting required subsidy notifications, the chair of the WTO ComEighty-nine members still have yet to submit their 2021 subsidy notifications by the mid-2021 deadline, Kerrlene Wills of Guyana, the committee chair, said. Another 76 members have not yet submitted their 2019 subsidy notifications, and 65 have not submitted their 2017 notifications.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, in a Federal Register notice published Oct. 26, asked for applications from people who would like to serve on panels that review final determinations in antidumping or countervailing duty proceedings and amendments to AD/CVD statutes of a USMCA Party. These people would be on the roster from April 1, 2023, through March 31, 2024. Applications are due by Nov. 30, and can be submitted at www.regulations.gov, docket number USTR-2022-0015.
The U.K.'s Trade Remedies Authority suspended antidumping duties imposed on imports of bicycles and bike parts from China, including bicycles consigned from Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan, the Philippines, Sri Lanka and Tunisia, imported by the Martlet Group, the Department for International Trade announced Oct. 24. The suspension runs from the date the notice was published and covers bicycle parts, including brake levers, coaster braking hubs, crank-gears, frames, handlebars and hub brakes.