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Strategies & Market Trends : Fascist Oligarchs Attack Cute Cuddly Canadians -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: marcos who wrote (317)	1/16/2002 3:15:11 AM
From: Snowshoe	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1293

U.S. Admits goofs on Slocan penalty Tuesday January 15, 6:50 pm Eastern Time Press Release U.S. Department of Commerce Acknowledges 'Ministerial Errors' in Slocan's Anti-Dumping Rate biz.yahoo.com RICHMOND, BRITISH COLUMBIA--Slocan Forest Products Ltd. announced today that it has been informed by the U.S. Department of Commerce (``DOC'') that the DOC agrees that ``ministerial errors'' were made by the DOC in its preliminary determination of Slocan's ``dumping margin'' in the anti-dumping duty case on softwood lumber. On October 30, 2001, the DOC issued its preliminary determination, and assigned Slocan a dumping margin of 19.24 percent. Slocan objected to this determination on the basis of several calculation errors, including the treatment of lumber donations as sales. The DOC has accepted that it made a number of ``ministerial errors'' in the calculation of Slocan's preliminary dumping margin. The errors accepted by the DOC would reduce Slocan's preliminary dumping margin by 4.8%, to 14.45%. However, DOC technical regulations require a minimum 5% variation caused by ``ministerial errors'' in order to change a preliminary determination. As a result the DOC has declined to take these admitted errors into account until it makes the final DOC determination in the case, which is expected in March 2002. In addition to the errors admitted by the DOC, Slocan has also pointed out to the DOC other calculation errors that would further decrease Slocan's dumping margin as determined by the DOC by at least as much, to less than 10%. The remainder of the preliminary dumping margin calculated for Slocan is the product of methodologies used by the DOC which Slocan, along with other Canadian softwood lumber producers, is challenging vigorously as inappropriate, generating false dumping margins. In reaction to the DOC decision, Mr. Jim Shepherd, President and Chief Executive Officer of Slocan, said: ``This confirms what we have said previously: the provisional dumping duty assigned to Slocan is bogus. The fact that we are unable to get this rectified now also confirms the inequity and imbalance of the U.S. administrative process we are forced to work with.'' Slocan Forest Products Ltd. is a major integrated forest products company with an annual capacity of 1.5 billion board feet of lumber, 30 thousand cubic metres of laminated beams, 300 million square feet of plywood (3/8 inch basis), 510 million square feet of oriented strand board (3/8 inch basis), 800,000 bone dry units of wood chips, and 240,000 tonnes of chemi-thermo mechanical pulp. The Company provides employment for approximately 4,000 persons directly and through its contractors.