The New York Times

February 18, 1990, Sunday, Late Edition - Final


HEADLINE: The Anti-Dumping Laws Do Work

BODY: To the Editor:

As administrator of the United States anti-dumping statute at the Commerce Department, I wish to note that in ''No Justice in Anti-Dumping'' James Bovard misstated department practice in several places (Forum, Jan. 28).

Most troubling was his assertion that the department has disclosed confidential information from foreign businesses to their American competitors. This is untrue. There are stringent rules to protect proprietary data, and sanctions to insure compliance. The integrity of this process lets us collect proprietary information and base dumping calculations on company-specific data.

And the criticism of the department's administrative review process is unfounded. Rather than inflate margins, it is designed to insure that dumping margins reflect up-to-date pricing practices. Once an order is issued, the department does not keep foreign firms ''under economic house arrest for the next 15 years.'' If no dumping margins are found three years in a row, anti-dumping orders can be lifted; more than 80 have been since 1980.

The article contains no recognition that anti-dumping regimes have their foundation in the GATT and are designed to deal with unfairly traded imports that injure a domestic industry. Other governments administer similar regimes, some with considerably less due process. The United States is addressing that problem in the current Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations.

The dumping law is an effective, internationally accepted way to handle unfair trade. It is complex and not perfect. But for American businesses there is justice in knowing that effective relief from unfairly traded goods is available.

ERIC I. GARFINKEL Assistant Secretary for Import Administration,




Department of Commerce Washington, Feb. 1