The U.S. is setting duties on Canadian softwood lumber that would effectively lower the punitive tariffs on most producers as the long-simmering trade dispute drags on. Average preliminary anti-dumping and countervailing duties of nearly 12% will be levied on Canadian softwood lumber producers, the U.S. Department of Commerce said Tuesday in an email. Read the article.

From 2010 to 2020, there were 759 anti-dumping and 159 countervailing investigations launched against China, data showed. Among them, 87 anti-dumping and 81 countervailing investigations were filed by the United States. Despite COVID-triggered shocks, China-U.S. trade volume hit a record high in 2021, highlighting the deep economic interdependence and trade dependability between the two sides. Read … Read More

On Wednesday, a WTO arbitrator in Geneva said China can retaliate against $645 million worth of annual American exports as part of a decade-old trade dispute over U.S. anti-subsidy duties on Chinese goods. The dispute dates back to 2012, when China complained that the U.S. imposed illegal countervailing duties on about a dozen Chinese imports … Read More

As if Biden’s continuation of Trump’s trade policies wasn’t bad enough, there are at least three areas where he’s probably been even worse. Perhaps most surprisingly, Biden has expressly rejected pursuing any new free trade agreements. This moratorium thus forecloses deals started under President Obama, such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership with Japan, Vietnam, Malaysia and … Read More

Many countries that rely on the Chinese market have long had to swallow China’s conditions regarding trade and investment. For example, the Chinese authorities often require foreign firms making direct investments in China to form a joint venture with a local partner, rather than establish a wholly owned subsidiary. Read the article.

President Joe Biden said that he’s not ready to lift tariffs his predecessor imposed on Chinese imports, despite calls from U.S. businesses to relieve the duties. U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai is “working on that right now,” Biden said at a news conference Wednesday marking his first year in office. But “the answer is uncertain,” he … Read More

“The post-Brexit EU is getting ever more protectionist, certainly with the French EU Presidency, which is pushing for a protectionist external EU ‘climate’ tariff, something that will hit EU consumers hard. “French President Macron is obviously using this to try to get re-elected, appealing to profound protectionist French instincts.” Read the article.

The second year of the Biden presidency opens with a widening realization that a Democrat-run White House is keeping Donald Trump’s protectionist trade policies: tariffs on steel, aluminum, and Chinese imports; domestic content requirements; and dim prospects for trade talks. Read the article.

Canada violated its promise to allow slightly more dairy imports by imposing unfairly complicated rules. The U.S. says Canada now has a few weeks to comply with the ruling, or face the possibility of a trade penalty such as a tariff. Canada left domestic processors in charge of allocating import permissions, known as tariff-rate quotas. … Read More