Petitioner Supports Pass-Through Analysis Results on Remand, Exporter Declines to Comment

A domestic petitioner said April 11 that it supports the Commerce Department’s result after a second remand that an Indonesian biodiesel exporter’s antidumping and countervailing duties hadn’t overlapped to create a double remedy -- a conclusion the department reached after it reluctantly conducted a court-ordered pass-through analysis (see 2403130049). The exporter also announced earlier that it wouldn't be submitting comments in opposition (Wilmar Trading PTE Ltd. v. U.S., CIT Consol. # 18-00121).

Commerce was correct that a pass-through analysis shouldn’t have been required of it to explain why it found a particular market situation and constructed a normal value for exporter Wilmar Trading (see 2403130049), petitioner National Biodiesel Board Fair Trade Coalition said. It said that requiring the analysis “placed an unreasonable evidentiary burden on Commerce that risks undermining the relief to which domestic parties are entitled by law.”

But it also said that it supports the results of the department’s pass-through analysis.

“Because there is no established methodology for conducting such an analysis with respect to domestic subsidies, Commerce reasonably utilized the methodology it has developed in implementing 19 U.S.C. § 1677f-1(f)(1), the only section of the Tariff Act of 1930, as amended, that contemplates adjusting antidumping duties to account for countervailable domestic subsidies,” it said.

It said that the department had answered the Court of International Trade’s concerns (see 2312120071) by “using an analytical framework” that has previously been upheld by U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit and by “supporting its finding with substantial evidence.”

Meanwhile, in a March 29 letter, plaintiffs led by Wilmar said that they would not be submitting comments in opposition to the final results.