New fabric trade group ponders legal action on Chinese imports
By Susan M. Andrews -- Furniture Today, May 3, 2004
New York — New York— The Upholstery Fabrics Group, the first upholstery fabric-specific arm of the National Textiles Assn., has formed and is investigating possible legal action on Chinese imports.
The inaugural meeting of the group was held here April 22. Roger Berkley, president of Weave Corp., was named chairman, and John Sullivan, CEO of American Silk Mills, is vice chairman.
Topics discussed included the status of NTA's round-robin laboratory tests of the proposed national standard for upholstered furniture flammability, which were presented March 1 to the Consumer Product Safety Commission. Other topics were compliance testing for offshore fabric producers, ongoing protection of intellectual property rights, and Chinese imports.
Berkley said the group asked David Trumbull, chief economist at NTA, to determine the viability of filing a safeguard or dumping action against China in two upholstery fabric categories. The first is the "cut-and-sewn kits" that are defined as furniture parts and therefore are exempt from duty and quota. "This category didn't exist four years ago," said Berkley, "and is now a significant concern.
"The second category is piece goods that are flooding the market at prices below the combined cost of raw materials available to (domestic) textile manufacturers." he said.
Other mills in the group are Absecon Mills, Craftex Mills, Dicey Fabrics, Milliken, Sunbury Textile Mills and Wearbest Sil-Tex. David Pettey, director of product development at Quaker Fabric, a member of NTA, agreed to head the group's technical subcommittee.
Meanwhile, several top textile executives met during the April High Point market to talk about launching an entirely new upholstery fabric group to protect the segment's interests on trade and regulatory issues. The coalition met previously during Showtime in High Point in January.
The High Point gathering included Larry Liebenow, president and CEO of Quaker, Jim McCulloch, president and CEO of Microfibres, Mike Shelton, president of Valdese Weavers, and Elkin McCallum, president and CEO of Joan Fabrics.
Liebenow, who is spearheading the fabric coalition, said the primary purpose of the market meeting was to review the progress of the flammability standard proposal at the CPSC, although trade issues and other areas of common interest also were addressed.
"Personally, I am encouraging other mills to join NTA," Berkley said, "because I think a united front is better than a fractured front, and NTA has the whole organizational thing together already. Starting another group is a waste of time and money."
Liebenow said, "The fabric coalition intends to continue to concentrate on the most efficient way to work together on issues specific to upholstery fabric manufacturers. There are several important producers of upholstery fabrics that are not members of NTA."
The fabric coalition has no plans to meet with the new NTA upholstery fabric group, but "we expect to work closely with them in a complementary way," Liebenow said.
The next meeting of the fabric coalition has not been set.
