The first of two days of hearings with retail trade associations and supply chain stakeholders took place on Tuesday in Washington as a part of the office of the United States Trade Representative’s Section 301 investigations into excess industrial capacity across 16 foreign economies. Launched in March along with a separate Section 301 investigation into alleged forced labor in supply chains across 60 countries, the probe focuses on whether U.S. trading partners are leveraging production capacity that exceeds the demands of the international market. The USTR is investigating the unfair advantages and government interventions, like subsidies, that play into the creation and maintenance of bloated manufacturing sectors. “This excess capacity leads to, among others, overproduction and large or persistent trade surpluses,” the USTR wrote in a March 11 report detailing the scope of the investigation.…