AD Petitioner Says Garlic Exporter's Goods Covered by Plain Language of AD Order

The Commerce Department "clearly considered" antidumping scope language highlighted by exporter Export Packers Co. in its challenge to the agency's inclusion of the company's garlic in the AD order on fresh garlic from China, petitioner Fresh Garlic Producers Association argued. Replying to Export Packers' motion for judgment on Nov. 19 at the Court of International Trade, the petitioner said the scope of the order explicitly covers the garlic at issue, which is separated into individual cloves and frozen (Export Packers Company Ltd. v. United States, CIT # 24-00061).

The association said Export Producers centered its argument on a single phrase in the scope language, which says the order doesn't cover garlic "prepared or preserved by the addition of other ingredients or heat processing" (see 2407170058). The exporter's argument "ignores key relevant terms included in the scope definition," the brief said.

The scope says subject merchandise includes "all grades of garlic, whole or separated into constituent cloves, whether or not peeled, fresh, chilled, frozen, provisionally preserved, or packed in water or other neutral substance." As a result, Export Packers' garlic clearly falls under the scope of the order, the brief said.

Commerce could have reasonably found, based on the scope language and prior scope rulings involving garlic cloves from importers Trinity and Amexim, that the scope language and (k)(1) sources were "dispositive" as to whether Export Packers' garlic cloves are subject to the order, the petitioner said. However, the agency said these sources weren't dispositive based on evidence Export Packers submitted on "changes in the allicin content resulting from Plaintiff's boiling process," along with the exporter's claims that its cloves were "cooked" rather than "blanched."

Due to the "explicit coverage" of the exporter's goods by the scope's "plain language" and Commerce's prior two scope rulings showing that garlic that had been boiled or subject to a "water-based heating element described as blanching," all the exporter could have hoped for was that the scope language and (k)(1) sources "were not dispositive" to its claim, the brief said.