[Federal Register Volume 67, Number 174 (Monday, September 9, 2002)]
[Notices]
[Pages 57211-57213]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 02-22841]


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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE

International Trade Administration

[A-570-502]


Iron Construction Castings from the People's Republic of China; 
Amended Final Results of Antidumping Duty Administrative Reviews in 
Accordance with Court Decision

AGENCY: Import Administration, International Trade Administration, U.S. 
Department of Commerce.

ACTION: Notice of Amended Final Results of Antidumping Duty 
Administrative Reviews in accordance with Court Decision.

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SUMMARY: On February 10, 2000, the Court of International Trade 
affirmed the remand determinations of the Department of Commerce (the 
Department) arising from the 1987-88, 1988-89 and 1989-90 
administrative

[[Page 57212]]

reviews of the antidumping duty order on iron construction castings 
from the People's Republic of China (PRC). See Sigma Corp. v. United 
States, 86 F. Supp. 2d 1344, 1353 (CIT 2000). Because this is the final 
and conclusive court decision with respect to entries during these 
periods of review, we will instruct the U.S. Customs Service to 
liquidate entries subject to these amended final results.

EFFECTIVE DATE: September 9, 2002.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Christian Hughes, Doug Campau or 
Maureen Flannery, Antidumping/Countervailing Duty Enforcement, Import 
Administration, International Trade Administration, U.S. Department of 
Commerce, 14th Street and Constitution Avenue, NW., Washington DC 
20230; telephone (202) 482-0648, (202) 482-1395, and (202) 482-3020, 
respectively.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

Scope of Antidumping Duty Order

    This order covers certain iron construction castings, limited to 
manhole covers, rings and frames, catch basins, grates and frames, 
cleanout covers and frames used for drainage or access purposes for 
public utility, water and sanitary systems, and to valve, service and 
meter boxes which are placed below ground to encase water, gas or other 
valves, or water or gas meters. The articles must be of cast iron, not 
alloyed, and not malleable. Until January 1, 1989, iron constructions 
castings were classified under item 657.0950 and 657.0990 of the TSUSA. 
This merchandise is currently classified under Harmonized Tariff System 
(HTS) items 7325.10.00.00 and 7325.10.00.50. The HTS and TSUSA item 
numbers are provided for convenience and Customs purposes. The written 
description remains dispositive of the scope of the order.

Background

    On May 9, 1986, the Department issued an antidumping duty order on 
iron construction castings from the PRC. See Antidumping Duty Order: 
Iron Construction Castings from the People's Republic of China, 51 FR 
17222 (May 9, 1986) (Antidumping Duty Order). On January 24, 1991, the 
Department published final results of the administrative reviews of 
iron construction castings for the 1987-88 and 1988-89 review periods. 
See Iron Construction Castings from the People's Republic of China; 
Final Results of Antidumping Duty Administrative Reviews, 56 FR 2742 
(January 24, 1991) (1987-88 and 1988-89). On March 27, 1992, the 
Department published the final results of the administrative review for 
the 1989-1990 period. See Iron Construction Castings from the People's 
Republic of China; Final Results of Antidumping Duty Administrative 
Reviews, 57 FR 10644 (March 27, 1992)
    (1989-90).
    In the 1987-88 and 1988-89 determinations, the Department concluded 
that no exporter had demonstrated that it was entitled to a separate 
rate. Therefore, it calculated a single country-wide, weighted-average 
margin for each of those reviews, based on data submitted by 
respondents. 56 FR at 2744. In the 1989-90 determination, the 
Department assigned a calculated separate rates margin of 92.74 percent 
to Guangdong Metals & Minerals Import & Export Corporation (Guangdong), 
and assigned the same margin, as best information available (BIA), as a 
country-wide rate to all other exporters. All of these determinations 
were appealed with respect to two types of issues relevant to these 
amended final results: (1) whether China National Machinery Import and 
Export Corporation (MACHIMPEX Liaoning) should be deemed included in 
the reviews, and (2) issues related to the calculation of the margins 
assigned for these periods.

Exclusion of MACHIMPEX Liaoning from Reviews

    With respect to MACHIMPEX Liaoning, the Court of International 
Trade held that, under the circumstances of the relevant cases, that 
company had not received adequate notice that it was subject to these 
reviews, and ordered the Department to assess duties against its 
entries for these periods at the 11.66 percent deposit rate that 
plaintiff Overseas Trade Corporation (Overseas) paid upon importation. 
Sigma Corp. v. United States, 841 F. Supp. 1255, 1273 (CIT 1993)(1987-
88/1988-89); Sigma Corp. v. United States, 841 F. Supp. 1275, 1285 (CIT 
1993)(1989-90). This issue was not further appealed. The Department, 
therefore, amends its final results in these reviews to provide that 
MACHIMPEX Liaoning entries for the periods 1987-88, 1988-89 and 1989-90 
will be liquidated at the 11.66 percent deposit rate.

1987-88/1988-89 Calculation Issues

    With respect to calculation issues in the 1987-88 and 1988-89 
reviews, on remand the Department made the changes to its final results 
described below. Some of these changes were addressed over the course 
of more than one remand.
    (1) The Department recalculated depreciation expense based on 
information on the record, specifically the public version of a 
depreciation schedule submitted in a companion case on iron 
construction castings from India. The Court of International Trade 
upheld this determination in Sigma Corp. v. United States, 890 F. Supp. 
1077, 1084 (CIT 1995), and the issue was not further appealed.
    (2) The Department recalculated Guangdong's labor costs in order to 
include the skilled labor cost of lathe operators. This approach was 
upheld by the Court of International Trade. Id. at 1085 (remanding for 
correction of a clerical error in the remand skilled labor calculation, 
but dismissing ``upon correction'' of the error). The issue was not 
further appealed.
    (3) The Department corrected clerical errors in its final results 
involving the amounts of aluminum and fireclay consumed in production. 
See Sigma Corp. v. United States, 841 F. Supp. 1255, 1274 (CIT 1993). 
This correction was upheld without comment in Sigma Corp. v. United 
States, 890 F. Supp. 1077, 1084 (CIT 1993), and was not further 
contested.
    (4) In accordance with the mandate of the Court of Appeals for the 
Federal Circuit (Sigma Corp. v. United States, 117 F.3d 1401, 1406-08 
(Fed. Cir. 1997)), Commerce devised a new methodology for valuing the 
inland freight component of constructed value for use when CIF import 
prices in a surrogate country are used to value inputs sourced 
domestically in non-market economy cases. Specifically, the Department 
used, for such inputs, a value for domestic inland freight based on the 
shorter of the reported distances from either the closest PRC seaport 
to the production site, or from the PRC domestic materials supplier to 
the production site. Sigma Corp. v. United States, 86 F. Supp. 2d 1344, 
1348 (CIT 2000). Because for most inputs the actual supplier was closer 
to the castings foundry than the nearest seaport was to the castings 
foundry, this change in methodology affected only a limited number of 
inputs. Id.

1989-90 Calculation Issues

    With respect to the calculation issues in the 1989-90 review, on 
remand the Department made the changes to its final results described 
below. Some of these issues were addressed over the course of more than 
one remand.
    (1) The Department recalculated surrogate values for pig iron and 
scrap iron, relying upon publicly available published import statistics 
on pig iron and scrap iron imported into India. For

[[Page 57213]]

pig iron, the Department, in a second remand, revised the tariff 
categories used in its first remand, to rely only upon the Indian 
tariff category for non-alloy pig iron containing less than 0.5 percent 
phosphorus. Sigma Corp. v. United States, 888 F. Supp. 159, 161 (CIT 
1995). This issue was not further appealed.
    (2) The Department recalculated its valuation of inland freight on 
inputs sourced domestically in China for which it had used CIF import 
prices in a surrogate country to value the inputs themselves. The 
Department used the methodology described at point (4), above, with 
respect to the 1987-88 and 1988-89 reviews. Sigma Corp. v. United 
States, 86 F. Supp. 2d 1344, 1348 (CIT 2000).
    (3) The Department recalculated the surrogate valuation of overhead 
for Guangdong's foundries in this review. Based on the sizes of the 
foundries in question, it calculated an overhead rate for Guangdong's 
medium-size foundries and a rate for its small foundry. These rates 
were upheld in Id., 86 F. Supp. 2d at 1349.

PRC-wide Rate for 1989-90

    Because the PRC-wide rate for the 1989-90 review period was based 
on Guangdong's calculated rate for that period, plaintiff importers 
also challenged the PRC-wide rate after Guangdong's original rate of 
92.74 percent for 1989-90 was reduced in the course of the litigation. 
In Sigma Corp. v. United States, 117 F.3d 1401, 1411 (Fed. Cir. 1997), 
the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit held that, by challenging 
Guangdong's rate, the importers did so not only as to Guangdong's 
exports, but also as to the exports made by the PRC-wide entity, to 
which that margin had been assigned. Thus, the Court of Appeals 
reversed the Department's reliance on the 92.74 percent BIA rate for 
the PRC-entity, and remanded for selection of a rate that had not been 
judicially invalidated. Id. In its amended remand of January 30, 1998, 
the Department selected, as BIA for the PRC-wide entity (which in this 
review encompasses all exporters other than Guangdong and MACHIMPEX 
Liaoning), a rate of 28.77 percent, the rate calculated for the PRC-
wide entity in that remand for the 1988-1989 period, and the highest 
margin not judicially invalidated at the time of that remand. This 
choice of a 1989-90 BIA rate for the PRC-wide entity was upheld in 
Sigma Corp. v. United States, 86 F.2d 1344, 1353 (CIT 2000), and was 
not further appealed.
    On February 10, 2000, the CIT upheld the Department's final 
redetermination on remand with respect to these reviews. Sigma Corp. v. 
United States, 86 F. Supp. 2d 1344 (CIT 2000). This decision was not 
appealed. There is now a final and conclusive court decision in this 
action. Thus, we are amending our final results of these reviews. The 
rates for these amended final results, which are the rates upheld by 
the CIT on remand, are:

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                  Period of Review                        Manufacturer/exporter           Margin (percent)
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5/1/1987-4/30/1988..................................                PRC-wide Rate*                         12.50
5/1/1988-4/30/1989..................................                PRC-wide Rate*                         28.77
5/1/1989-4/30/1990..................................   Guangdong Metals & Minerals                         22.50
                                                       Import & Export Corporation
5/1/1989-4/30/1990..................................                PRC-wide rate*                         28.77
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 * As explained above, the Court of International Trade determined that China National Machinery Import and
  Export Corporation (MACHIMPEX Liaoning) is not within the scope of review for 1987-1988, 1988-1989, and 1989-
  1990. Duties for Overseas Trade Corporation (Overseas) imports from MACHIMPEX Liaoning are to be assessed at
  the 11.66 percent deposit rate that Overseas paid upon importation, rather than at the PRC-wide rate.

    Accordingly, the Department will determine, and the United States 
Customs Service will assess, antidumping duties on all entries of 
subject merchandise in accordance with these amended final results. 
Individual differences between United States price and foreign market 
value may vary from the percentages stated above. The Department will 
issue appraisement instructions directly to Customs. The above rates 
will not affect the cash deposit rates currently in effect, which 
continue to be based on the margins found to exist in the most recently 
completed reviews for the relevant companies.
    This notice is published in accordance with Sec. 751(a)(1) of the 
Tariff Act of 1930, as amended (19 U.S.C. 1675(a)(1)) and 19 CFR 
351.221.

    Dated: August 29, 2002.
Faryar Shirzad,
Assistant Secretary for Import Administration.
[FR Doc. 02-22841 Filed 9-6-02; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510-DS-S