BEDFORD, MA, September 12, 2014-

In the five months since the Chinese Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) made the final determination on dumping duties in the viscose pulp market there has been no change in pricing in the Chinese market. In fact, prices for imported viscose pulp have actually dropped $30/tonne since April 6, when the final duties were announced. And viscose pulp prices are now back to their lowest point since the middle of 2009. The bureaucrats in the ministry must be scratching their heads, trying to figure out why their efforts to penalize the three largest importing countries of viscose pulp are not helping domestic producers by encouraging higher prices.

One factor that has tended to undermine the effectiveness of the dumping duties is that the final duties were diluted compared to the preliminary ones. In particular, the one Brazilian producer that was named in the suit had its duty reduced to only 6.8%, which comes nowhere near its cost advantage versus most suppliers to the Chinese market. Additionally, this company can bypass the duty completely by selling its pulp at a floor price to its sister VSF operations in China. US companies also had their duties reduced compared to the preliminary figures, although they still received the highest penalties, at around 17% for most producers. Duties on most of the Canadian companies stayed at the preliminary rate of 13%, except for the one producer owned by a Chinese VSF producer, which received a "de minimis" duty that is not being applied.

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