CVD Petitioner Says Commerce Improperly Accepted Post Hoc Audit of Indian Export Subsidy Program
The Commerce Department improperly found that exporter Balkrishna Industries didn't benefit from the Advanced Authorization Scheme in India as part of the 2022 review of the countervailing duty order on new pneumatic off-the-road tires from India, petitioner Titan Tire Corp. argued. Filing a complaint at the Court of International Trade on Dec. 20, Titan Tire said Commerce erred in accepting a "post hoc and incomplete examination" of the program performed by the Indian government (Titan Tire Corp. v. United States, CIT # 24-00207).
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Timely, relevant coverage of court proceedings and agency rulings involving tariffs, classification, valuation, origin and antidumping and countervailing duties. Each day, Trade Law Daily subscribers receive a daily headline email, in-depth PDF edition and access to all relevant documents via our trade law source document library and website.
In the original CVD investigation, Commerce found that the Advanced Authorization Scheme is a countervailable export subsidy that gives import duty exceptions to Indian manufacturers. This finding was made after the Indian government failed to show that its Norms Committee has an "adequate procedure in place" under Commerce's regulations to "ensure the ad hoc norms chosen by" Balkrishna "reflect actual consumption," the petitioner said. The Indian government confirmed that it doesn't regularly conduct audits for the program.
However, in the 2022 review, Commerce said the Indian government properly conducted an examination of the inputs involved to confirm which ones are made in the production of the subject tires and in what amounts.
Titan Tire said this examination was conducted after the period of review "and solely for the purpose of the review." As a result, the agency incorrectly found that Balkrishna "had not used, and did not benefit from," the program, the complaint said. The result was a de minimis 0.35% rate for Balkrishna and 1.7% rate for the non-selected companies.