US container glass manufacturers have welcomed a decision into antidumping duties of Chinese imports of glass.

The US Department of Commerce issued a preliminary determination in the antidumping duty (AD) investigation into Chinese imports of glass containers.

It found that Chinese producers of glass containers dumped glass containers in the United States and assigned antidumping duty rates as high as 255.68%.

This determination accompanies an affirmative preliminary determination in the companion countervailing duty (CVD) investigation on glass containers, which was reached in February 2020 and yielded margins ranging from 22.60% to 315.73%.

The American Glass Packaging Coalition (AGPC), a coalition of producers of food and beverage glass packaging containers, filed AD and CVD petitions on September 25, 2019.

It requested Commerce investigate unfair pricing and subsidisation of the Chinese glass container industry.

Unfair pricing has resulted in an influx of cheaply priced imports of glass containers, which have severely harmed the US glass container industry.

“Chinese producers of glass containers are selling at dumped prices in the United States, which harm the domestic glass container industry,” said Daniel B. Pickard, partner in the International Trade Practice at Wiley Rein LLP and counsel to the AGPC.

“Affirmative preliminary determinations in both the AD and CVD cases are a step in the right direction to ensure that the US industry is on a fair playing field with its Chinese competitors,” Mr. Pickard said.

Following this affirmative preliminary finding, Commerce will begin collecting provisional antidumping duties based on these margins.

Commerce will make its final CVD determination on May 11, 2020 and its final AD determination in early September.

Source: Glass International