Wereldhandelsorganisatie fiatteert handelssancties tegen VS zolang het "Byrd"-amendement in stand blijft (en)

The WTO arbitrators have today given a green light for eight WTO Members to retaliate up to more than $150 million against the U.S. for failing to comply with its international trade obligations. In January 2003, the WTO ruled as illegal a piece of U.S. legislation commonly known as the "Byrd Amendment", under which anti-dumping and countervailing duties are distributed to the domestic companies that had requested or supported the imposition of those duties. The WTO gave the U.S. until December 2003 to comply with the WTO ruling but the U.S. missed this deadline. The failure by the U.S. to bring its measure into conformity with WTO rules prompted eight WTO members - Brazil, Canada, Chile, the EU, India, Korea, Japan and Mexico - to request authorisation from the WTO to impose additional import duties on US products or to suspend other obligations to the US. Further to today's award, the co-complainants may exercise their retaliatory rights, at any time deemed appropriate, in accordance with the award and the requirements of the WTO rules on the settlement of trade disputes. The award of the Arbitrators cannot be appealed. The eight WTO Members strongly urge the US to act immediately to repeal the illegal "Byrd Amendment".

In today's decision, the WTO has taken the approach to calculate the level of the additional import duty or other countermeasures based on the amount of payments disbursed to the US industry in the latest annual distribution. Specifically, the authorized level of retaliation is based on the trade effects of the most recent payments distributed from anti-dumping or countervailing duties collected on the products originating from each Member.  Accordingly those payments shall be multiplied by a factor of 0.72, which is based on an economic model developed by the arbitrator to determine such trade effects.

The level of sanctions may vary every year so as to reflect the wide variations in the amount of payments made under the Byrd amendment from one year to the other.

Background

The Continued Dumping and Subsidy Offset Act of 2000 (so-called Byrd amendment) mandates the distribution of the anti-dumping and countervailing duties to the companies that brought or supported the complaints. It therefore creates an undue incentive for U.S. industries to seek the imposition of duties on imported goods, thereby improving their competitive position and receiving cash payments.

A total of US $ 231 million was distributed in 2001 and around US $ 330 million in 2002. The main recipients have been in the bearing, steel and other metal, household item and food (in particular pasta) sectors. Though 2003 data regarding disbursements has yet to be finalised, information published so far indicates that distribution for that year would amount to about US $ 240 million.

Eleven WTO Members (Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, EU, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Mexico and Thailand) combined forces to challenge the WTO compatibility of the legislation in 2001. A Panel in September 2002 and the Appellate Body in January 2003 confirmed that the Byrd amendment is an illegal response to dumping and subsidisation. The US had until 27 December 2003 to bring this legislation into conformity with the WTO rules. Eight WTO members (Brazil, Canada, Chile, the EU, India, Korea, Japan and Mexico) then requested the DSB to authorize the countermeasures on 26 January 2004. The US objected to these requests and the issue of the level of countermeasures was referred to arbitration.

Despite calls by the US administration to repeal the law, the US Congress has not yet implemented the WTO ruling. Two bills are pending, but neither has so far reached the discussion stage.