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NAFTA upholds U.S. softwood lumber ‘injury’ complaint

A North American Free Trade Agreement panel has upheld the latest U.S. lumber industry trade complaint against Canadian softwood lumber, reports the Surrey Now-Leader.

The NAFTA panel has reviewed the U.S. International Trade Commission’s (USITC) determination of “injury” to U.S. lumber trade from Canadian lumber, in the latest of a decades-long series of trade and legal actions brought by U.S. forest industry representatives.

B.C. Council of Forest Industries president and CEO Susan Yurkovich says the “unsupportable decision” doesn’t change Canada’s position.

“Even with the decision affirming the USITC remand determination on injury, the Canadian parties still have pending World Trade Organization and NAFTA challenges to the Department of Commerce’s underlying countervailing duty and anti-dumping duty determinations that have yet to be resolved,” said Yurkovich in a statement.

“We are confident that those proceedings will yield favourable results as they have done in the past, and the duties ultimately will be ruled to be unwarranted.”

Read the full story here.