Furniture Business News

From then to now: An antidumping timeline

August 20th, 2007

Furniture Today,
HIGH POINT — Here’s how events have unfolded in the long-running case that led to U.S. antidumping duties on imports of Chinese wood bedroom furniture.

July 2003 – The American Furniture Manufacturers Committee for Legal Trade announces it will seek an antidumping investigation into Chinese-made wood bedroom furniture, and later files a petition to that effect with the U.S. government.

December 2003 – The U.S. Department of Commerce agrees to launch an investigation.

June 2004 – The government releases the preliminary results of the investigation. This established preliminary duties on wood bedroom furniture imported from China.

December 2004 – The government announces revised duties on these imports.

January 2006 – The U.S. Department of Commerce begins the first administrative review process of duty rates on Chinese bedroom furniture exports. The review covers shipments between June 24, 2004 and Dec. 31, 2005.

February 2006 – Petitioners submit a list of 56 companies to the DOC that it wants reviewed. Including requests from other sources, the DOC receives more than 100 requests for individual reviews.

March 2006 – The DOC releases a list of 107 factories that were chosen for review and begins the process.

June-July 2006 – The DOC identifies five Chinese case goods companies as “mandatory respondents” in the first review. The government considers the five to be the largest exporters of Chinese wood bedroom furniture. These five companies will determine the extent to which retroactive duties will or will not be paid by factories starting in the summer of 2007.

November 2006 – The DOC permanently eliminates Lacquer Craft duties, which originally were 2.66%. The parent company of Universal and Legacy Classic was one of the six mandatory respondents in the original antidumping investigation. This raises the Section A rate from 6.65% to 7.24% for 117 other companies.

December 2006 – U.S. Customs and Border Protection distributes $21.8 million in duties collected to the petitioners. It holds another $9.95 million due to pending litigation by Furniture Brands International and Standard Furniture, which were not petitioners but are seeking shares of the duties. 

February 2007 – The DOC announces preliminary duties resulting from its first administrative review, covering the 2004 and 2005 periods.

March 2007 — The DOC initiates the second review, covering shipments made in 2006. It names 196 companies it will review.

August 2007 – Final results of the first administrative review are released, giving the final word on the 2004-2005 duties.

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