The International Wood Products Association (IWPA) on Thursday announced its opposition to a petition from U.S. plywood makers asking the U.S. government to impose import tariffs on plywood from China.
The IWPA cited "devastating" unintended consequences the tariffs could have on U.S. consumers and manufacturers. The petitioners, the Coalition for Fair Trade of Hardwood Plywood (CFTHP), have asked the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) to investigate whether China is unfairly subsidizing its own plywood manufacturers, and also whether the product is then sold to the U.S. at lower prices than the plywood costs to produce, a situation called "dumping". If the ITC determines the U.S. manufacturers have suffered material injury as a result of the subsidies and dumping, the U.S. Department of Commerce could then impose import tariffs on Chinese plywood.
The IWPA maintains the CFTHP is seeking to cut off a large supply of "badly needed" plywood at a time when the U.S. economic recovery is fragile at best, and that, even though a product is made in China, it still helps contribute to the U.S. economy. In a press release, the IWPA cited statistics from the Wall Street Journal that showed up to 55 cents of every $1 spent on a product with a "Made in China" label "actually goes to Americans who design the products; manufacture components that are shipped to China for final assembly; transport the goods; market and retail them; finance their production and trade, and so on."
Further, IWPA said that artificially increasing the cost of products from China will lead to job losses in the U.S., and that forcing tariffs on plywood from China will cause affected companies to relocate manufacturing operations to countries like the Philippines, Indonesia, Brazil and Vietnam.
"The evidence is overwhelming," said Brent McClendon, the IWPA's executive vice president. "Efforts to cripple competition with government sanctions always result in devastating unintended consequences. This shortsighted tactical maneuver to create shortages through the exploitation of antidumping and countervailing duty laws is bad for the U.S. economy, American consumers, and even the domestic hardwood industry itself."
