On January 11th, the U.S. International Trade Commission (USITC) voted in favor of keeping in place the antidumping duty orders on uncoated paper imported from Australia, Brazil, China, Indonesia, and Portugal.
Antidumping and countervailing duties are typically reviewed by the ITC five years after implementation to determine whether revocation of the orders would likely lead to material injury to the industry.
To support efforts to maintain the orders and effectively fight for USW Paper Sector jobs, International Vice President Leeann Foster testified to the USITC in November and detailed the critical impact that the existing orders have had on USW-represented paper employers.
In her testimony, Vice President Foster stated, “When a paper machine goes down, local tax revenues are deeply affected; not only due to jobs lost at the mill, but also due to the six to seven jobs in the community that rely on that paperworker. When an entire paper mill goes down, it is like an economic bomb going off in the community – deeply impacting not only the workers and the jobs those workers support, but also schools and local governments in the area as revenue is lost, as well as the service industry such as hotels and restaurants in the area, many of which exist to support the mill, the paperworkers, and their families”.
Closures like that of Georgia-Pacific’s uncoated capacity at its Port Hudson, LA, or Domtar’s Port Huron, MI mill, resulted in the loss of hundreds of good-paying union jobs and has had devastating effects on those local communities. Undoubtedly, if the orders had been revoked by the USITC, unfairly traded imports would have quickly accelerated additional losses in the domestic uncoated paper industry, just as they did in the original investigation.
The USW continually works with legal counsel and international trade advocacy groups to spearhead investigations into unfair trade practices that impact our members.