Given ever-accelerating consumer internet usage, particularly via Wi-Fi, policymakers mustn't "get too infatuated with fixed, exclusive wireless spectrum," NCTA President Michael Powell said last week in a video discussion with David Don, Comcast's senior vice president-public policy. There's a far greater need for unlicensed spectrum, he said. A particular challenge is showing regulators that Wi-Fi "is something like a garden you have to continue to fertilize and grow," especially since the average of 17 devices on home Wi-Fi networks will multiply in five to 10 years. Powell said DOD uses most of the high-quality spectrum that interests commercial markets and thus can't be repurposed solely for commercial use. Dynamic spectrum-sharing technology is the obvious route to avoid repeated fights between DOD and the commercial sector, he added.
The Court of International Trade in an April 22 confidential decision remanded the International Trade Commission's injury determination on phosphate fertilizer from Morocco and Russia. A docket entry from the court said on remand the ITC can "take new evidence, reconsider existing evidence, or take any other action allowed by its procedures" to reach a conclusion supported by substantial evidence (OCP v. United States, CIT Consol. # 21-00219).
The Commerce Department recently issued antidumping and countervailing duty orders on melamine from India (A-533-924/C-533-925). The orders set permanent antidumping and countervailing duties, which will remain in place unless revoked by Commerce in a sunset or changed circumstances review. Commerce will now begin conducting annual administrative reviews, if requested, to determine final assessments of AD/CVD on importers and make changes to cash deposit rates.
In April 8 oral argument involving a large number of parties, Court of International Trade Judge Jane Restani said she thinks she knows how she’ll rule on a petitioner’s Tier 2 price benchmark question about whether Kazakh natural gas export prices are available to Russian purchasers (Archer Daniels Midland Co. v. United States, CIT # 23-00239).
A listing of recent Commerce Department antidumping and countervailing duty messages posted on CBP's website April 4, along with the case number(s) and CBP message number, is provided below. The messages are available by searching for the listed CBP message number at CBP's ADCVD Search page.
Trade groups mostly reacted in alarm to the dramatic change in tariffs with every country that is coming this month, whether because of expected retaliation against their exports or, in the case of sectors that are largely supplied by imports, the increase in costs.
The White House released two annexes to its proclamation setting 10% reciprocal tariffs April 5, and higher country-specific tariffs for some on April 9, including a list of goods excluded from the tariffs, some because they're potentially subject to Section 232 actions.
The Commerce Department properly found that the provision of mining rights by the Moroccan government didn't confer a benefit to countervailing duty respondent OCP and that the provision of port services was not countervailable, the Court of International Trade held on April 1.
The Court of International Trade on April 1 sustained parts and remanded parts of the Commerce Department's 2020-21 review of the countervailing duty order on phosphate fertilizers from Morocco. Judge Timothy Stanceu rejected Commerce's finding that Morocco's program for relief from tax fines and penalties is specific to OCP. The judge sustained the remaining issues in the case, which included Commerce's decision not to find a benefit from the provision of mining rights by the Moroccan government, its decision not to countervail the provision of port services, its use of adverse facts available for respondent OCP's failure to report a payroll tax refund, and its ability to request information from OCP on unspecified "other benefits" it received.
The Commerce Department announced April 1 the opportunity to request administrative reviews by April 30 for producers and exporters subject to 36 antidumping duty orders and 14 countervailing duty orders with April anniversary dates.