US probing tire imports from South Korea, Thailand, Taiwan, Vietnam
25 June, 2020
The US Commerce Division said on Tuesday it had opened investigations into vehicle tire imports from South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam to identify if the tires are for sale at less than fair value.
The section said it was also investigating whether tire producers in Vietnam were receiving unfair subsidies for passenger vehicle and light truck (PVLT) tires.
The investigations were in response to petitions filed in-may by the United Steelworkers (USW) representing employees at US tire plants.
"Despite the fact that demand for PVLT tires increased, domestic producers were even now forced to grapple with minimal market share, falling revenue and lost jobs," USW International President Tom Conway said earlier.
The union won orders on imported vehicle tires from China in 2015, and Chinese imports have since shrunk dramatically, allowing the domestic industry to purchase new capacity, the union said.
AMERICA imported almost $4 billion in tires from the four nations, including practically $2 billion from Thailand and $1.2 billion from Korea, in 2019. The USW explained tire imports from the four countries contain risen almost 20% since 2017, achieving 85.3 million tires.
The Commerce Department said the alleged dumping margins range from 43% to 195% for Korea, 21% to 116% for Taiwan, 106% to 217.5% for Thailand and 5% to 22% for Vietnam.
The USW represents staff at Michelin, Goodyear , Cooper, Sumitomo and Yokohama tire plants in Ohio, Arkansas, North Carolina, Kansas, Indiana, Virginia NY and Alabama.
This month, Hankook Tires urged the Commerce Department never to investigate, saying the united states household tire industry "is in robust health and growing." In a good filing it said, domestic car tire producers "as a whole have certainly not been materially wounded and are not threatened with materials injury by purpose of subject imports."
Vietnam's Ministry of Industry and Trade told Commerce its market is "heavily reliant on light cars and passenger automobiles for transportation, logistics and travelling and the PVLT tire market is essential for our continued economical advancement."
Source: www.thejakartapost.com
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