Olive Growers: Digging Deeper to Deliver - McDermott Will & Emery

Olive Growers: Digging Deeper to Deliver

THE CHALLENGE:

Spanish ripe olive producers were gaining US market share at the expense of the US industry by undercutting US prices and taking large customers. The situation created an unsustainable competitive environment for US processors and growers.

THE OUTCOME:

We drew on our wide-ranging experience with US trade remedy law and our deep understanding of EU agriculture subsidy practices to craft a US import relief action on behalf of the US industry that targeted the Spanish industry’s unfair pricing and unfair benefits from vast EU and Spanish government subsidies.

We refuted arguments by not only the Spanish industry, but also the governments of the European Union and Spain, in persuading the US Department of Commerce to find unfair pricing (dumping) and unfair subsidization of Spanish ripe olive imports into the United States, and we persuaded the US International Trade Commission that the unfairly traded imports were a cause of “material injury” to the US industry.

Our client had hoped to secure remedial tariffs (antidumping and countervailing duties) of 30% on the incoming olives. Our trade action resulted in a net 35% tariff.

LEARN MORE:

Read more about this matter in the following media coverage.