The New Nation - Internet Edition

BSS, Dhaka

To protect domestic industries Bangladesh needs to develop the capacity to detect dumping by other countries, FBCCI suggested on Saturday.

It would enable Bangladesh to lodge anti-dumping cases with the WTO and exercise its right to impose countervailing duty to protect domestic manufacturing, it said.

"Bangladesh became the dumping ground for many cheaper products," discussants said at a presentation at the FBCCI emphasising the need for remedial measures to counter it

"We are failing to detect, as per the WTO procedure, dumping at regular pace by India and China, to seek remedial measures," they said. A participant said China's atempts at dumping in the India's market was facing strong resistance.

Similarly, said speakers, Brazil was resisting such moves. They said, least developed countries (LDCs) like Bangladesh were yet to develop the capacity to counteract dumping.

He said, though sugar sells at Rs 17 per kg in Kolkata markets India exports it to Bangladesh at a price of Rs 10 per kg. The Indian central government as well as provincial government, he said, were giving subsidy of 65 US dollars per tonne of sugar export to Bangladesh.

Such subsidized export by India, he said, was destroying the Bangladesh sugar industry. "Bangladesh needs to learn how to make a case out of it to be able to claim remedial measures," he emphasized. Gustav Brink, a consultant, made the resentation on the subject "Trade Defense Mechanism in Bangladesh."

A team of experts under a project, funded by the European Commission, worked out a 'guide to anti-dumping investigation' for Bangladesh Tariff Commission, he said.

The objective of the project is to build Tariff Commission's capacity in the area and suggest how to collect information on dumping, how to process it and make disclosures to authorities, he said. The government in an affected country has the right to impose countervailing duty against dumped products if it can prove at the arbitration that some exporters are dumping cheaper products below the normal export prices with the support of subsidy from government of the exporting country.