[Federal Register Volume 81, Number 173 (Wednesday, September 7, 2016)]
[Notices]
[Pages 61666-61668]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2016-21501]


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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE

International Trade Administration

[A-433-812, A-423-812, A-351-847, A-580-887, A-583-858, A-489-828, C-
580-888]


Certain Carbon and Alloy Steel Cut-to-Length Plate From Austria, 
Belgium, Brazil, the Republic of Korea, Taiwan, and Turkey; Antidumping 
and Countervailing Duty Investigations: Preliminary Determinations of 
Critical Circumstances

AGENCY: Enforcement and Compliance, International Trade Administration, 
Department of Commerce.

SUMMARY: The Department of Commerce (the Department) preliminarily 
determines that critical circumstances exist for imports of certain 
carbon and alloy steel cut-to-length plate (CTL plate) from certain 
producers and exporters from Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Taiwan, and 
Turkey.

DATES: Effective September 7, 2016.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Edythe Artman at (202) 482-3931 
(Austria), Elizabeth Eastwood at (202) 482-3874 (Belgium), Mark Kennedy 
at (202) 482-7883 (Brazil), Steve Bezirganian at (202) 482-1131 (Korea-
AD), John Corrigan at (202) 482-7438 (Korea-CVD), Tyler Weinhold at 
(202) 482-1121 (Taiwan), or Dmitry Vladimirov at (202) 482-0665 
(Turkey), AD/CVD Operations, Enforcement and Compliance, International 
Trade Administration, U.S. Department of Commerce, 1401 Constitution 
Avenue NW., Washington, DC 20230.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

Background

    In response to petitions filed on April 8, 2016,\1\ the Department 
of Commerce (the Department) initiated antidumping duty (AD) 
investigations concerning imports of CTL plate from Austria, Belgium, 
Brazil, the People's Republic of China (PRC), France, the Federal 
Republic of Germany (Germany), Italy, Japan, the Republic of Korea 
(Korea), South Africa, Taiwan, and Turkey \2\ and countervailing duty 
(CVD) investigations concerning CTL plate from Brazil, the PRC, and 
Korea.\3\ On July 26, 2016, the Department received timely allegations, 
pursuant to sections 703(e)(1) and 733(e)(1) of the Tariff Act of 1930, 
as amended (the Act), and 19 CFR 351.206, that critical circumstances 
exist with respect to imports of CTL plate from Austria, Belgium, 
Brazil, Korea, Taiwan, and Turkey.\4\ Based on information provided by 
the petitioners, data placed on the record of these investigations by 
the mandatory respondents, and data collected by the Department from 
Global Trade Atlas (GTA), the Department preliminarily determines that 
critical circumstances exist for imports of CTL plate from certain 
producers and exporters from Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Taiwan, and 
Turkey.
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    \1\ See Certain Carbon and Alloy Steel Cut-to-Length Plate from 
Austria, Belgium, Brazil, the People's Republic of China, France, 
the Federal Republic of Germany, Italy, Japan, the Republic of South 
Africa, Taiwan, and Turkey--Petitions for the Imposition of 
Antidumping and Countervailing Duties, dated April 8, 2016 
(collectively, the petitions). The petitioners for these 
investigations are ArcelorMittal USA LLC, Nucor Corporation, and 
SSAB Enterprises, LLC (the petitioners).
    \2\ See Certain Carbon and Alloy Steel Cut-To-Length Plate From 
Austria, Belgium, Brazil, France, the Federal Republic of Germany, 
Italy, Japan, the Republic of Korea, the People's Republic of China, 
South Africa, Taiwan, and the Republic of Turkey: Initiation of 
Less-Than-Fair-Value Investigations, 81 FR 27089 (May 5, 2016).
    \3\ See Certain Carbon and Alloy Steel Cut-to-Length Plate From 
Brazil, the People's Republic of China, and the Republic of Korea: 
Initiation of Countervailing Duty Investigations, 81 FR 27098 (May 
5, 2016).
    \4\ See Certain Carbon and Alloy Steel Cut-To-Length Plate From 
Austria, Belgium, Brazil, the Republic of Korea, Taiwan, and Turkey: 
Critical Circumstances Allegations, July 26, 2016 (Allegations).
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    Pursuant to 19 CFR 351.206(c)(2), the petitioners requested that 
the Department issue a preliminary affirmative determination of 
critical circumstances on an expedited basis. In accordance with 
sections 703(e)(1) and 733(e)(1) of the Act, because the petitioners 
submitted their critical circumstances allegations more than 20 days 
before the scheduled date of the final determination, the Department 
must promptly issue preliminary critical circumstances determinations.
    Section 703(e)(1) of the Act provides that the Department will 
determine that critical circumstances exist in CVD investigations if 
there is a reasonable basis to believe or suspect: (A) That ``the 
alleged countervailable subsidy'' is inconsistent with the Agreement on 
Subsidies and Countervailing Measures (SCM Agreement) of the World 
Trade Organization, and (B) that ``there have been massive imports of 
the subject merchandise over a relatively short period.'' Section 
733(e)(1) of the Act provides that the Department will preliminarily 
determine that critical circumstances exist in AD investigations if 
there is a reasonable basis to believe or suspect: (A)(i) That ``there 
is a history of dumping and material injury by reason of dumped imports 
in the United States or elsewhere of the subject merchandise,'' or (ii) 
that ``the person by whom, or for whose account, the merchandise was 
imported knew or

[[Page 61667]]

should have known that the exporter was selling the subject merchandise 
at less than its fair value and that there was likely to be material 
injury by reason of such sales,'' and (B) that ``there have been 
massive imports of the subject merchandise over a relatively short 
period.'' Section 351.206(h)(2) of the Department's regulations 
provides that, generally, imports must increase by at least 15 percent 
during the ``relatively short period'' to be considered ``massive'' and 
section 351.206(i) defines a ``relatively short period'' as normally 
being the period beginning on the date the proceeding begins (i.e., the 
date the petition is filed) \5\ and ending at least three months 
later.\6\ The regulations also provide, however, that, if the 
Department ``finds that importers, or exporters or producers, had 
reason to believe, at some time prior to the beginning of the 
proceeding, that a proceeding was likely,'' the Department ``may 
consider a period of not less than three months from that earlier 
time.'' \7\
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    \5\ See 19 CFR 351.102(b)(40) (providing that a proceeding 
begins on the date of the filing of a petition).
    \6\ See 19 CFR 351.206(i).
    \7\ Id.
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Alleged Countervailable Subsidies Are Inconsistent With the SCM 
Agreement

    To determine whether an alleged countervailable subsidy is 
inconsistent with the SCM Agreement, in accordance with section 
703(e)(1)(A) of the Act, the Department considered the evidence 
currently on the record of the Korea CVD investigation. Specifically, 
as determined in our initiation checklist, the following subsidy 
programs, alleged in the petition and supported by information 
reasonably available to the petitioners, appear to be either export 
contingent or contingent upon the use of domestic goods over imported 
goods, which would render them inconsistent with the SCM Agreement: 
Korean Export-Import Bank Short-Term Export Credits; Korean Export-
Import Bank Export Factoring; Korean Export-Import Bank Export Loan 
Guarantees; Korean Export-Import Bank Trade Bill Rediscounting Program; 
Korea Development Bank (KDB) Short-Term Discounted Loans for Export 
Receivables; Loans under the Industrial Base Fund; Korea Trade 
Insurance Corporation (K-SURE) Short-Term Export Credit Insurance; and 
K-SURE Export Credit Guarantees.\8\
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    \8\ See Korea CVD Initiation Checklist, April 28, 2016, at 7-16.
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    Therefore, the Department preliminarily determines for purposes of 
this critical circumstances determination that there are alleged 
subsidies in the Korea CVD investigation that are inconsistent with the 
SCM Agreement.

History of Dumping and Material Injury/Knowledge of Sales Below Fair 
Value and Material Injury

    In order to determine whether there is a history of dumping 
pursuant to section 733(e)(1)(A)(i) of the Act, the Department 
generally considers current or previous AD orders on subject 
merchandise from the country in question in the United States and 
current orders imposed by other countries with regard to imports of the 
same merchandise.\9\ Although the Department has not previously issued, 
nor are we aware of any other World Trade Organization member issuing, 
AD orders on CTL plate from the six countries, the petitioners point to 
a pattern of dumping of similar merchandise by companies subject to 
these investigations.
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    \9\ See Certain Oil Country Tubular Goods From the People's 
Republic of China: Notice of Preliminary Determination of Sales at 
Less Than Fair Value, Affirmative Preliminary Determination of 
Critical Circumstances and Postponement of Final Determination, 74 
FR 59117, 59120 (November 17, 2009) unchanged in Certain Oil Country 
Tubular Goods from the People's Republic of China: Final 
Determination of Sales at Less Than Fair Value, Affirmative Final 
Determination of Critical Circumstances and Final Determination of 
Targeted Dumping, 75 FR 20335 (April 19, 2010).
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    To determine whether importers knew or should have known that 
exporters were selling at less than fair value, we typically consider 
the magnitude of dumping margins, including margins alleged in 
petitions.\10\ The Department has found margins of 15 to 25 percent 
(depending on whether sales are export price sales or constructed 
export price sales) to be sufficient for this purpose.\11\ The 
Department initiated these AD investigations based on the following 
estimated dumping margins: (1) Austria ranges from 35.50 to 121.90 
percent; (2) Belgium is 51.78 percent; (3) Brazil is 74.52 percent; (8) 
Korea ranges from 44.70 to 248.64; (10) Taiwan ranges from 8.30 to 
77.13 percent; and (11) Turkey ranges from 34.03 to 50.00 percent.\12\ 
All of these margins are above the 15 to 25 percent threshold.\13\ 
Therefore, on that basis, we preliminarily conclude that importers knew 
or should have known that exporters in all six countries were selling 
subject merchandise at less than fair value.
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    \10\ See, e.g., Notice of Preliminary Determinations of Critical 
Circumstances: Certain Cold-Rolled Carbon Steel Flat Products from 
Australia, the People's Republic of China, India, the Republic of 
Korea, the Netherlands, and the Russian Federation, 67 FR 19157, 
19158 (April 18, 2002) (unchanged in the final determination).
    \11\ See, e.g., Preliminary Determination of Sales at Less Than 
Fair Value: Certain Cut-to-Length Carbon Steel Plate from the 
People's Republic of China, 62 FR 31972, 31978 (June 11, 1997) 
(unchanged in the final determination) and Notice of Preliminary 
Determination of Sales at Less Than Fair Value, Negative Preliminary 
Determination of Critical Circumstances and Postponement of Final 
Determination: Certain Frozen and Canned Warmwater Shrimp From the 
Socialist Republic of Vietnam, 69 FR 42672 (July 16, 2004) 
(unchanged in the final determination).
    \12\ See CTL Plate Initiation of Less-Than-Fair-Value 
Investigations, 81 FR 27089, 27094. These margins differ from those 
in the petitions with respect to Austria, Brazil, Korea, and Taiwan.
    \13\ Although the lowest margin for Taiwan is below the 
threshold, the Taiwan margins ranged as high as 77.13 percent which 
is well above the threshold.
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    To determine whether importers knew or should have known that there 
was likely to be material injury, we typically consider the preliminary 
injury determinations of the International Trade Commission (ITC).\14\ 
If the ITC finds material injury (rather than the threat of injury), we 
normally find that the ITC's determination provided importers with 
sufficient knowledge of injury. In these investigations, the ITC's 
preliminary finding of material injury by reason of imports of CTL 
plate from, inter alia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Korea, Taiwan, and 
Turkey is sufficient to impute knowledge of the likelihood of material 
injury for each of these countries.\15\
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    \14\ See, e.g., Certain Potassium Phosphate Salts from the 
People's Republic of China: Preliminary Affirmative Determination of 
Critical Circumstances in the Antidumping Duty Investigation, 75 FR 
24572, 24573 (May 5, 2010), unchanged in Certain Potassium Phosphate 
Salts from the People's Republic of China: Final Determination of 
Sales at Less Than Fair Value and Termination of Critical 
Circumstances Inquiry, 75 FR 30377 (June 1, 2010).
    \15\ See Certain Carbon and Alloy Steel Cut-to-Length Plate from 
Austria, Belgium, Brazil, China, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, 
Korea, South Africa, Taiwan, and Turkey, Inv. Nos. 701-TA-559-561 
and 731-TA-1317-1328 (Preliminary), USITC Publication 4615, May 
2016) at 1.
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Massive Imports

    In determining whether there have been ``massive imports'' over a 
``relatively short period,'' pursuant to sections 703(e)(1)(B) and 
733(e)(1)(B) of the Act, the Department normally compares the import 
volumes of the subject merchandise for at least three months 
immediately preceding the filing of the petition (i.e., the ``base 
period'') to a comparable period of at least three months following the 
filing of the petition (i.e., the ``comparison period''). Imports 
normally will be considered massive when imports during the comparison 
period have increased by 15 percent or more compared to imports during 
the base period.

[[Page 61668]]

    Thus, because the petitions were filed on April 8, 2016, in order 
to determine whether there has been a massive surge in imports for each 
cooperating mandatory respondent, the Department compared the total 
volume of shipments during the period April 2016 through June 2016 with 
the volume of shipments during the preceding three-month period of 
January 2016 through March 2016. For Brazil and Turkey, because the 
mandatory respondents refused to participate in the investigations, we 
determine, on the basis of adverse facts available, that there has been 
a massive surge in imports. For ``all-others,'' the Department relied 
on GTA data which demonstrates that the volume of CTL plate from Brazil 
and Turkey increased massively in the three month period April 2016 
through June 2016 when compared to the prior three-month period.\16\
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    \16\ See respective preliminary critical circumstances memoranda 
for each proceeding, dated concurrently with this notice.
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    For the cooperating respondents in the investigations on Austria, 
Belgium, Korea, and Taiwan, we compared the total volume of shipments 
during the period April 2016 through June 2016 with the volume of 
shipments during the preceding three-month period of January 2016 
through March 2016. For ``all-others,'' the Department compared GTA 
data for the same time periods.\17\ We subtracted shipments reported by 
the mandatory respondents from the GTA data. With respect to Korea, the 
shipment data do not demonstrate massive surges in imports for any 
producers/exporters. Therefore, we are reaching a preliminary negative 
critical circumstances determination with respect to Korea. With 
respect to Austria, Belgium, and Taiwan, we preliminarily determine the 
following producers/exporters had massive surges in imports.\18\
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    \17\ The Department gathered GTA data under the following 
harmonized tariff schedule numbers: 7208.40.3030, 7208.40.3060, 
7208.51.0030, 7208.51.0045, 7208.51.0060, 7208.52.0000, 
7211.13.0000, 7211.14.0030, 7211.14.0045, 7225.40.1110, 
7225.40.1180, 7225.40.3005, 7225.40.3050, 7226.20.0000, and 
7226.91.5000.
    \18\ See respective preliminary critical circumstances memoranda 
for each proceeding, dated concurrently with this notice.
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     Austria (A-433-812): Voestalpine Grobblech GmbH, 
voestalpine Steel & Service Center GmbH, Bohler Edelstahl GmbH & Co. 
KG, BOHLER Bleche GmbH & Co. KG, Bohler Uddeholm Corporation, and 
Strudell Industries, Inc. (collectively, Voestalpine);
     Belgium (A-423-812): Industeel Belgium SA and NLMK Clabecq
     Taiwan (A-583-858): China Steel Corporation and All-Other 
producers/exporters.

Conclusion

    Based on the criteria and findings discussed above, we 
preliminarily determine that critical circumstances exist with respect 
to imports of CTL plate shipped by certain producers/exporters. Our 
findings are summarized as follows.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                             Affirmative preliminary      Negative preliminary
              Country                      Case No.          critical circumstances      critical circumstances
                                                                 determinations              determinations
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Austria...........................  A-433-812............  Voestalpine...............  All-Other producers/
                                                                                        exporters.
Belgium...........................  A-423-812............  Industeel Belgium SA, NLMK  All-Other producers/
                                                            Clabecq.                    exporters.
Brazil............................  A-351-847............  All producers/exporters...
Korea.............................  A-580-887............  ..........................  POSCO/POSCO Daewoo
                                                                                        Corporation, All-Other
                                                                                        producers/exporters.
Korea.............................  C-580-888............  ..........................  POSCO/POSCO Daewoo
                                                                                        Corporation, All-Other
                                                                                        producers/exporters.
Taiwan............................  A-583-858............  China Steel Corporation     Shang Chen Steel Co.,
                                                            All-Other producers/        Ltd.
                                                            exporters.
Turkey............................  A-489-828............  All producers/exporters...
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Final Critical Circumstances Determinations

    We will issue final determinations concerning critical 
circumstances when we issue our final countervailing duty and less than 
fair value determinations. All interested parties will have the 
opportunity to address these determinations in case briefs to be 
submitted after completion of the preliminary countervailing duty and 
less than fair value determinations.

ITC Notification

    In accordance with sections 703(f) and 733(f) of the Act, we will 
notify the ITC of our determinations.

Suspension of Liquidation

    In accordance with section 733(e)(2) of the Act, because we 
preliminarily found that critical circumstances exist with regard to 
exports made by certain producers and/or exporters, if we make an 
affirmative preliminary determination that sales at less than fair 
value have been made by these same producers/exporters at above de 
minimis rates,\19\ we will instruct Customs and Border Protection (CBP) 
to suspend liquidation of all entries of subject merchandise from these 
producers/exporters that are entered, or withdrawn from warehouse, for 
consumption on or after the date that is 90 days prior to the effective 
date of ``provisional measures'' (i.e., the date of publication in the 
Federal Register of the notice of an affirmative preliminary 
determination of sales at less than fair value at above de minimis 
rates). At such time, we will also instruct CBP to require a cash 
deposit equal to the estimated preliminary dumping margins reflected in 
the preliminary determination published in the Federal Register. This 
suspension of liquidation will remain in effect until further notice.
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    \19\ The preliminary determinations concerning sales at less 
than fair value are currently due on September 15, 2016.
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    Because we preliminarily found that critical circumstances do not 
exist with respect to the CVD investigation of CTL plate from Korea, we 
will not order any retroactive suspension of liquidation under section 
703(e)(2) of the Act in the event of an affirmative preliminary 
countervailing duty determination in this investigation.
    This notice is issued and published pursuant to section 777(i) of 
the Act and 19 CFR 351.206(c)(2).

    Dated: August 30, 2016.
Christian Marsh,
Deputy Assistant Secretary for Antidumping and Countervailing Duty 
Operations.
[FR Doc. 2016-21501 Filed 9-6-16; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510-DS-P