NEWS

Decorative Hardwoods Association® President Kip Howlett spoke at the World Resources Institute's Forest Legality Week about how tariffs, duties, and legality impact wood products trade flows and how these changes make tracing the source of legal timber particularly challenging. The international event drew participants from governments, the private sector, the scientific community, and timber certification organizations.

Decorative Hardwoods Association® (formerly HPVA) eNews Volume XI, Issue XIX: China's Exports Surge | Change To Tariff Schedule Affects Plywood | Exporters Dodge Tariffs | Global Construction Set To Rise To $13 Trillion

Exporters Dodge Tariffs, China's Exports Surge - http://eepurl.com/dKKflw

A federal district court approved Lumber Liquidators' $36 million settlement in a class-action lawsuit for formaldehyde emissions violations. The lawsuit was filed on behalf of 760,000 customers who purchased Chinese-made laminate flooring from the company between 2009 and 2015. Lumber Liquidators, who initially disputed the findings of a 60 Minutes investigative report, was also fined $2.5 million by CARB in 2016.

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Some Chinese exporters are changing the HTS destination codes on products to dodge tariffs, reports the Wall Street Journal. Right after the U.S. Department of Commerce opened a Chinese dumping investigation in November 2016 on hardwood-faced plywood, some Chinese producers began shipping plywood under four codes related to softwood-faced plywood. U.S. imports of Chinese hardwood-faced plywood dropped 20% last year while imports coded as softwood-faced plywood shot up 549%.

The U.S. request to revise wood product tariff schedules was approved, separating plywood into two new subheadings. Subheading 4412.32 for plywood has been cut and replaced with 4412.33 for plywood with at least one outer ply of specified species. Subheading 4412.34 was created for plywood with at least one outer ply of a species of non-coniferous wood.

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