The strategic use of anti-dumping in international trade

Abstract

Although anti-dumping duties are the official countermeasure to the unfair trading practice known as injurious dumping, it is alleged that in some cases anti-dumping duties are being used to protect certain strategic industries against competitive rather than dumped imports. Although conventional economic wisdom is against such protectionism, some economists argue that certain sensitive and strategic industries may need to be protected against competitive imports even at the cost of economic welfare. This paper argues that more attention should be paid to those strategic industries to establish what is really happening in these industries, while less time and effort should be spent trying to change the Anti-dumping Agreement. © 2006 The Author. Journal compilation © 2006 Economic Society of South Africa.