WASHINGTON (Feb. 2, 2017) — The U.S. Department of Commerce has adjusted its antidumping duty findings for OTR tires imported from India, raising them to 3.67 percent from "de minimis."
Commerce cited errors in its calculations with respect to ATC Tires Pvt. Ltd.'s freight expenses, home market credit expenses and U.S. indirect selling expenses, the agency said in a Feb. 2 Federal Register notice.
In light of this, the agency issued a revised 3.67-percent antidumping rate against ATC, and applied the same rate to all other Indian OTR importers.
In its final antidumping and countervailing duty determinations issued Jan. 4, the Commerce Department found no evidence of dumping against Indian OTR tire importers. The agency did issue countervailing duty rates of 5.36 percent against Balkrishna Industries Ltd., 4.9 percent against ATC and 5.06 percent against all others.
Commerce also levied countervailing duties of 2.18 percent against Sri Lankan OTR tire producers. Sri Lankan companies were not investigated for dumping.
Titan Tire Corp. and the United Steelworkers (USW) union petitioned Commerce on Jan. 17, alleging the agency had made ministerial errors in determining the Indian OTR antidumping rate. Those errors were related to the application of partial adverse facts available (AFA), the petitioners said.
Titan and the USW petitioned the International Trade Commission in January 2016, seeking antidumping and countervailing duty relief against Indian and Sri Lankan OTR tire imports under Sections 701 and 731 of the Trade Act.
The ITC is scheduled to vote Feb. 17 on whether Indian and Sri Lankan OTR tire imports caused material injury to the U.S. OTR tire industry. If the vote is affirmative, the countervailing and antidumping duties will become official.