The domestic producers of polyester staple for fiberfill end-uses including DuPont, KoSa, Nan Ya
International Polymers and Wellman, recently filed an anti-dumping petition on imports of fiberfill
from South Korea and Taiwan with the U.S. Department of Commerce and the U.S. International
International Trade Commission.The petition alleges that the U.S. polyester staple producers are
being materially injured and are threatened with continued material injury by reason of imports
that are being dumped or sold in the United States at less-than-fair value.It seeks imposition of
substantial anti-dumping duties on the exporting countries, to offset the difference between their
average export prices for sales of the product and their average prices for contemporaneous home
market sales.According to Wellman, between 1996 and 1998, U.S. apparent domestic fiberfill
consumption grew 41 percent. For the same period, the volume of subject imports originating from
South Korea and Taiwan grew by more than 136 percent, while U.S. producer shipments grew a mere 3
percent.The combined South Korean and Taiwanese share of the U.S. market increased nearly 17
percentage points on an absolute basis, while U.S. producers saw their share of the domestic market
drop nearly 18 percent.
May 1999
