Producers reluctant to seek trade remedies under WTO rules

Asjadul Kibria | Published: March 07, 2015 00:00:00 | Updated: November 30, 2024 06:01:00

It was more than a year ago when the country's tea producers sought remedial measures from the safeguard authority concerned against huge import of the commodity from other countries.
In response to the appeal, the safeguard authority, the Bangladesh Tariff Commission, initiated an investigation and detected a sudden rise in imports which was hurting the domestic producers. Thus, it found a ground for imposing safeguard duty on imports.
The domestic producers, however, later on withdrew the application they had submitted to the Tariff Commission and turned to the National Board of Revenue (NBR).
Later, as sought by the Bangladesh Tea Association (BTA), the tax authority increased the regulatory duty on tea import from 5 per cent to 15 per cent.
The tea association's final action highlights the local producers' reluctance to get any trade remedial measure against sudden or abnormal surge in imports.
Due to such reluctance, the Tariff Commission is yet to take any trade remedial measure even four and a half years after it was asked to act as the safeguard body as defined under the WTO (World Trade Organisation) rules. In June 2010 the government named the chairman of the Bangladesh Tariff Commission (BTC) as the designated safeguard authority.
The core function of the safeguard authority is to investigate whether a surge in import of a particular product is hurting a similar local product and recommend necessary remedial measures like imposition of safeguard duty. Â
Safeguard duty is one of the three trade remedies endorsed by the WTO. Two others are anti-dumping duty and countervailing duty.
"We are ready to help local producers against unfair imports through trade remedial measures," said Dr Md Azizur Rahman, chairman of the BTC.
"But, local industries or businesspeople have to come up with necessary information. Moreover, we can't impose any remedial duty without proper investigation," he added.
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