[Industry news] WTO panel to rule on Vietnam complaint on U.S. duties on fish fillets

The World Trade Organization (WTO) set up a dispute panel on Friday to rule on Vietnam’s complaint against anti-dumping measures imposed by the United States on fish fillets imported from Vietnam, a WTO official said.

The decision was taken on July 20 after Vietnam made its second request at a closed-door meeting of the WTO’s Dispute Settlement Body, in line with WTO rules, said Reuters, citing a WTO official.

Vietnam made its first complaint in January 2018. It requested that “consultations” concerning “certain US anti-dumping laws, regulations, administrative procedures, practices and methodologies, as well as certain anti-dumping determinations in administrative reviews on fish fillets”, the WTO said.

This came in response to news that the US Department of Commerce planned to hit each Vietnamese pangasius firm with the same blanket anti-dumping tariff, from March 2018.

In February Vietnam filed a second complaint, claiming the US pangasius inspections regime amounts to unfair trade.

(Source: Undercurrentnews)