Since its inception as a member of World Trade Organisation in 2007, Vietnam for the first time has requested that the organisation’s Dispute Settlement Body (DSB) establish a panel to resolve a conflict on US-imposed anti-dumping measures on certain shrimp shipped from Viet Nam.
The effort is on to force US to lift anti-dumping tariff on Vietnam’s shrimp. Cooperation with the US is better than facing anti-dumping duties. Nguyen Chi Mai, director of the anti-dumping, anti-subsidy and trade safeguard of Competition Administration Department, under the Vietnamese Ministry of Industry and Trade, told that they have a solid foundation to believe that they can pull it off, because many countries have filed similar cases on various products, and they have already succeeded.
Ambassador Vu Dung, permanent representative of Viet Nam to the United Nations Office, the WTO and other international organisations in Geneva, was addressing the DSB meeting saying that Viet Nam had taken this action only after careful deliberation and consultation with the US.
He informed that the main issue involved in our request for a panel is the ’zeroing practice’, specifically zeroing in periodic reviews under US law. According to him “Zeroing” refers to a practice that treats all non-dumped sales as having a dumping margin of zero rather than a negative, thereby preventing non-dumped sales from offsetting dumped sales.
Viet Nam and the US held consultations on the case on March 23 in Geneva with the hope of reaching a mutually satisfactory solution. The parties at the consultations gained a better understanding of the issue, but did not reach a solution in the matter.
