Milliken & Company
February 7, 2007

Hon. Charles B. Rangel
Chairman
Committee on Ways and Means
U.S. House of Representatives
1102 Longworth House Office Building
Washington, DC  20515

Dear Chairman Rangel:

On behalf of Milliken & Company, these comments are submitted in response to the Advisory from the Committee on Ways and Means, dated January 31, 2007, requesting comments from the public on what action, if any, the Committee should take with respect to the modification the Department of Commerce (“Commerce”) has proposed to its calculation of weighted average dumping margins in investigations.   

Milliken & Company is located in Spartanburg, South Carolina, and is one of the largest privately held textile and chemical manufacturers in the world.  Milliken is an international leader in research technology, innovation, and customer service.  Milliken’s rich history of technological innovation has resulted in more than 2,000 patents and the development of the largest textile research center in the world.  

We urge the Committee to oppose the modification to our trade remedy laws proposed by Commerce.   Commerce’s change will potentially reduce or eliminate dumping margins in many cases and thus deny domestic producers needed relief from unfair trade.  The modification proposed by Commerce would abandon longstanding policy by eliminating “zeroing” in average to average comparisons in antidumping investigations.  The proposed approach would fail to capture one hundred percent of dumping identified in the calculation of the dumping margin, which could expose domestic producers to unfair import competition without recourse to adequate relief under our trade remedy laws.

The Committee should ask Commerce to withdraw the proposed change, and the Committee should vote under Section 123(g)(3) of the Uruguay Round Agreements Act (19 U.S.C. § 3533(g)(3)) to signal its opposition to the proposed modification.  Instead of implementing the modification as proposed, Commerce should pursue clarification of U.S. rights through negotiations at the WTO.  Finally, Milliken & Company urges the Committee to take all necessary steps to ensure that U.S. trade remedy laws are not weakened through the implementation of erroneous and overreaching decisions of WTO dispute settlement panels and the Appellate Body. 

The WTO’s decisions on “zeroing” have created obligations for the U.S. that are not found in the text of the WTO Agreements.  The U.S. government has recognized this problem, and it called the WTO decision Commerce is proposing to implement “deeply flawed.”  When WTO panels and the Appellate Body violate the rules of the WTO Agreement by issuing decisions that exceed their authority, the U.S. should  work to preserve the balance of rights and obligations it agreed to by seeking a negotiated solution that reaffirms the rights of the U.S. at the WTO.  The United States should also work to fix dispute settlement rules to stop overreaching by WTO panels and the Appellate Body, particularly in the trade remedy area. 

Congress has also identified WTO overreaching as a serious concern, pointing in particular to the issue of “zeroing.”  Commerce should not be rushing to implement a WTO decision that both the Administration and Congress find to be fundamentally flawed.  Instead, the U.S. should ensure that U.S. rights are honored in WTO disputes and that the full strength and effectiveness of our domestic trade remedy laws is preserved.

Milliken & Company urges the Committee to vigorously oppose the change proposed by Commerce.  Instead, Congress should require Commerce to continue its long-standing practice of capturing one hundred percent of dumping when calculating dumping margins in investigations and the United States should continue to pursue clarification of U.S. rights through negotiations at the WTO. 

We appreciate the Committee’s attention to this important issue, and are grateful for the opportunity to provide these comments.

Respectfully submitted,

John F. Nash Jr.
Washington Counsel