On February 17, Vietnam’s Ministry of Industry and Trade issued Resolution No. 235/QD-BCT dated February 13, 2023, making an affirmative final ruling on anti-dumping of tables, chairs and accessories originating in China, and decided to levy duties on Chinese chairs and accessories 21.4% anti-dumping duty, 35.2% anti-dumping duty on Chinese table and its accessories.
The tariffs have been imposed since February 13 for a period of five years. The "significant" increase in imports of tables and chairs from China has severely affected local Vietnamese manufacturers, the ministry said in a statement, without elaborating on the impact.
Vietnam proposed an investigation into Chinese furniture imports in October last year, and the investigation lasted for four months.
At present, China is Vietnam's largest trading partner and the main source of Vietnam's manufacturing materials and equipment. In terms of specific data, in the first nine months of 2022, the bilateral trade between China and Vietnam was 131.7 billion U.S. dollars, of which Vietnam imported 91.6 billion U.S. dollars from China; during the same period, exports to China were 40.1 billion U.S. dollars. In the end, Vietnam’s trade deficit with China was 51.5 billion U.S. dollars. That's an increase of 21.3% year-on-year.
Separately, the ministry also said it had halted an anti-dumping investigation on furniture imported from Malaysia. The statement said: It was ruled that there was dumping of the products involved in Malaysia, but the import volume was a small amount (less than 3%), and it was decided to terminate the anti-dumping investigation on the products involved in Malaysia and not implement anti-dumping measures.
The Vietnamese HS codes of the products involved in this case are 9401.31.00, 9401.39.00, 9401.41.00, 9401.49.00, 9401.61.00, 9401.69.90, 9401.71.00, 9401.79.90, 9401.80.00 and 9403.30.00. The measures are effective from February 13, 2023.