[Federal Register: June 1, 2005 (Volume 70, Number 104)]
[Notices]
[Page 31427]
From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
[DOCID:fr01jn05-50]
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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
International Trade Administration
North American Free-Trade Agreement, Article 1904; NAFTA Panel
Reviews; Notice of Panel Decision
AGENCY: NAFTA Secretariat, United States Section, International Trade
Administration, Department of Commerce.
ACTION: Notice of panel decision.
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SUMMARY: On May 20, 2005, the binational panel issued its decision in
the review of the final results of the affirmative countervailing duty
re-determination on remand made by the International Trade
Administration (ITA) respecting Certain Softwood Lumber Products from
Canada (Secretariat File No. USA-CDA-2002-1904-03). The panel issued
its third remand to the Department of Commerce. The Department will
return the third re-determination based on the remand instructions of
the panel. A copy of the complete panel decision is available from the
NAFTA Secretariat.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Caratina L. Alston, United States
Secretary, NAFTA Secretariat, Suite 2061, 14th and Constitution Avenue,
Washington, DC 20230, (202) 482-5438.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Chapter 19 of the North American Free-Trade
Agreement (``Agreement'') establishes a mechanism to replace domestic
judicial review of final determinations in antidumping and
countervailing duty cases involving imports from the other country with
review by independent binational panels. When a Request for Panel
Review is filed, a panel is established to act in place of national
courts to review expeditiously the final determination to determine
whether it conforms with the antidumping or countervailing duty law of
the country that made the determination.
Under Article 1904 of the Agreement, which came into force on
January 1, 1994, the Government of the United States, the Government of
Canada and the Government of Mexico established Rules of Procedure for
Article 1904 Binational Panel Reviews (``Rules''). These Rules were
published in the Federal Register on February 23, 1994 (59 FR 8686).
Panel Decision: On May 20, 2005, the Binational Panel issued its
third remand to the Department of Commerce's final countervailing duty
determination on remand. The following issues were remanded to the
Department:
1. The Department is directed, subject to the conditions set forth
at the end of Section V of the opinion, to reopen the record for the
limited purpose of developing price information for sales reported by
syndicates in the Province of Quebec and to verify such information to
the extent it feels appropriate. The Department is directed to grant
sufficient time to accomplish this task, and to recalculate the Quebec
benchmarks including this price information;
2. The Department is directed to recalculate the profit earned by
log sellers in Quebec starting with a blended price combining both
private logs and imported logs;
3. The Department is directed to grant exclusions from the
countervailing duty order to sales by Ontario companies for which the
``input source'' was unsubsidized, and to exclude those sales from the
denominator of its benefit/countervailing duty rate calculations;
4. The Department is directed to include in its calculations for
Ontario, the profit earned by private log sellers; and
5. The Department is directed to match the numerators to the
denominators of its countervailing duty rate calculations.
Commerce was directed to issue it's determination on remand within
45 days of the issuance of the pane decision or within 45 days of the
receipt of information obtained pursuant to the reopening of the
record.
Dated: May 26, 2005.
Caratina L. Alston,
United States Secretary, NAFTA Secretariat.
[FR Doc. E5-2773 Filed 5-31-05; 8:45 am]