Double-count Issues In The United States' Concurrent Anti-dumping And Countervailing Measures Against China

Double remedies,as the name implies,refer to the potential "double counting" when anti-dumping duties are imposed on certain products of the same type while anti-dumping duties are added,that is,the use of double anti-policies for certain products of the same type In turn,the same part of the subsidy is offset by a second time.From another point of view,when anti-subsidy tax is levied at the same time as a certain type of commodity,anti-dumping tax is levied to offset market distortions.Subsidies can be divided into two types: domestic subsidies and export subsidies.Among them,the "dual relief" phenomenon brought about by the conditions of export subsidies has been explicitly prohibited in the "General Agreement on Tariffs and Customs and Trade" issued by the United States in 1994.The main reason is that this phenomenon violates its rule of "the tax cannot be repeated under the same circumstances" and violates the appropriateness of the bill.In contrast,due to the“dual relief” under domestic subsidy conditions,the phenomenon of “double anti”policies against market economy countries often does not occur,so no clear relevant provisions can be found in the legal provisions of the WTO.Therefore,it can be understood that “dual relief” under domestic subsidies is a relatively blank field.Inrecent years,during the investigation of some commodities originating from countries under non-market economies in the United States,it has slowly caused people to Attention.Among the conditions mentioned above,from the perspective of legislative reasons,because the US Department of Commerce is accustomed to treating China as a country under a non-market economy,it is conducting a "double-reverse" approach to goods imported from China.During the investigation,non-market economic rules are used to calculate the dumping margin.Most of them will adopt the factor of production method or the substitute country method instead of using the domestic market selling price as the reference basis for prices.The substitution prices of the tripartite countries(mostly countries under the market economy system)are compared with the subsidized export pricing,resulting in the imbalance between export pricing and normal pricing in the calculation of the dumping margin of domestic subsidies,which makes anti-dumping duties The offset market distortions include the impact of domestic subsidies on the export pricing of products.In the above conditions,in accordance with the relevant provisions of the "Countervailing Subsidy Law" promulgated by the United States,a countervailing duty levied on imported subsidized goods can be used to offset the subsidy amount.In this way,in the domestic law of the United States,Countries using a market economy system adopting the "dual anti" policy will definitely cause a "dual relief" phenomenon.As mentioned earlier,the WTO has not made any statement on the "dual relief" under domestic subsidies,and has not proposed a ban.This is approved by the expert group.However,the appeal department corrected this error.They pointed out that the non-market calculation rule was used to calculate the dumping margin of a certain commodity,and then the anti-dumping tax was levied.The practice of equalizing the amount of subsidies is contrary to the expression of "appropriate amount" in the "Anti-Subsidy Law" promulgated previously.The legal interpretation of WTO rules should be consistent and coherent,so that the legal significance of the terms has a practical guiding role.Therefore,when anti-subsidy taxes are imposed on certain types of commodities,it must be considered whether anti-dumping taxes have offsetsome subsidies.At the same time,in cases related to "double relief",the United States attempted to completely transfer the burden of obtaining evidence to the responding party to make it believe that the country's domestic subsidies will affect export pricing.Not only that,during the evaluation of the transmission mechanism of the subsidy amount,the scope was too narrow,the cost of the responding company was not taken into account,and the method adopted was too general.When calculating the dumping margin,due to different calculation methods,the transmission mechanism of subsidies to commodity prices may not be accurately reflected in the formula.