Lankan tyre exports to US to be slapped with anti-dumping duties

• USITC investigation says tyre imports hurting US industry
• Five of the six USITC members vote in support of findings
• Anti-dumping duties will come into effect retrospectively 

Certain new pneumatic off-the-road tyres imported to the US from Sri Lanka and India will shortly be subjected to anti-dumping and countervailing duties following a recently concluded United States International Trade Commission (USITC) investigation.
“USITC today determined that a U.S. industry is materially injured by reason of imports of certain new pneumatic off-the-road tyres from India that the U.S. Department of Commerce has determined are sold in the United States at less than fair value and are subsidized by the governments of India and Sri Lanka,” a USITC statement said.
Five of the six USITC members had voted in support of the findings, while another had not taken part in the investigation.
Accordingly, the US Department of Commerce will be issuing the antidumping and countervailing duty orders in the future.
Tyres which have been imported to the US from India and Sri Lanka since June 20, 2016, when a US Department of Commerce had made similar preliminary findings determinations, will be subjected to retrospective countervailing duties as well.

Investigations had begun in January 2016, when Titan Tire Corporation, Des Moines, Iowa and the United Steel, Paper and Forestry, Rubber, Manufacturing, Energy, Allied Industrial and Service Workers International Union, AFL-CIO, CLC of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania had filed petitions.
The US currently has 6 companies engaged in producing the types of tyres that now fall under the antidumping orders.
Sri Lanka and India had exported US$ 229 million worth of such tyres to the US during 2015, while other countries had exported US$ 829 million worth of such products to the US during the same year as well.
In 2015, Sri Lanka had exported US$ 467 million worth of rubber tyres, down from US$ 564 million in 2014.
US importers of Sri Lankan and Indian tyres had been lobbying against such action, and a reversal is unlikely, given the protectionist policies being implemented by new US President Donald Trump.