Jon Caspers, a pork producer from Swaledale, Iowa and a past president of NPPC stated, "We have not had a chance to review the Commerce Department's analysis, but it is public knowledge that the Canadian producers have received large amounts of subsidies over the years. We expect that when the Department reaches its final determination, there will be an affirmative determination of countervailable subsidies."

On March 5, 2004, the National Pork Producers Council, along with state pork producer organizations and individual U.S. pork producers, filed antidumping and countervailing duty petitions with the U.S. government in an effort to redress the injury that has been caused by the recent surge in unfairly traded imports of hogs from Canada.

With these petitions, the U.S. industry hopes to remedy the imbalance in the marketplace that has been caused by unfair Canadian trade practices. On May 7, the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) unanimously found that that there is a reasonable indication of injury to U.S. pork producers from unfairly traded hog imports from Canada. Early next year the Commerce Department will render its final subsidy determination followed by the final ITC investigation.

In a separate but related case, the Department of Commerce has postponed a preliminary ruling concerning whether Canadian hogs are being dumped in the U.S. market. That ruling, which could impose duties, is expected on October 15, 2004.

Source: National Pork Producers Council (NPPC) - 17th August 2004