Why Does The EU'S Trade Survey With China Become Frequent After A Brief Silence?

After nine months of silence, since September, the EU has repeatedly lifted the "stick" of Trade Research on Chinese products: on September 4th and 5, the European Union launched anti-dumping investigations on the citric acid and MSG produced by China respectively. The export of China's energy saving lamps to the European Union has been levied for five years, and the European Commission recommends that it impose 1 years anti-dumping duty on China's energy-saving lamps.

Recalling that China's products suffered from EU trade surveys in recent years, we can see obvious ups and downs: in 2005 and 2006, the European Union launched 9 or 12 trade relief investigations against China respectively, and in 2007, a rare silence period came from the European Union's trade survey.

Entering the September, the EU's trade survey with China is frequent again.

"The EU's internal interest groups have been playing a fierce game. This year's EU trade survey with China fluctuates, which is just an external manifestation of this game."

Wu Zhenchang, chairman of Panyu Chuangxin Shoes Co., Ltd.

In the EU anti-dumping investigation on Chinese shoe products, Wu Zhenchang has launched the EU's anti dumping alliance against China's shoes products.

In the shoe case, we have already felt the serious differences between different interest groups within the European Union.

Footwear industry alliance Secretary General Guo Weiwen said.

Last October 4th, the European Union ended the protracted debate and finally decided to impose anti-dumping duties on Chinese leather shoes. Although the period of Taxation has been changed from two years to five years without precedent, the result still caused dissatisfaction among some interest groups within the European Union.

In fact, EU's "reflection" on trade policy has already made a real move: in December 2006, the EU Trade Commission issued a "green paper" to solicit public opinions, and launched the first large-scale assessment and discussion of trade measures including anti-dumping measures in 10 years.

EU Trade Commissioner Mandelson recently revealed that the results of the "green paper" will be announced in the near future, and the European Commission will review trade measures such as anti-dumping.

Like the shoe case, more and more trade protection cases have made the European Commission's officials in a dilemma. The recently widely controversial case of energy-saving lamps is a typical example: in 2001, the EU began to levy a 5 year antidumping tax on China's energy-efficient light bulbs.

When the measure expired in July 2006, the European Union launched a 15 month investigation. The original anti-dumping measures were still applied during the investigation.

Recently, the European Commission recommended that 1 years of anti-dumping duties be imposed on China's energy-saving bulbs.

Jia Qiang, general manager of Xiamen Donglin Electronics Co., Ltd. believes that if this proposal is adopted, it will not only hurt the interests of Chinese producers, but also make some European manufacturers suffer a lot, because most of the EU manufacturers of lamps, including PHILPS Holland, have pferred most of their production to China. The anti-dumping duties imposed by the EU have made these enterprises more competitive and more competitive.

In the European Union, the extension of energy-saving lamp anti-dumping is also criticized by environmentalists. The EU trade policy, while safeguarding the interests of producers, violates the EU's goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions and reducing energy consumption.

EU Trade Commissioner Mandelson said publicly that although trade punitive measures such as levying anti-dumping duties are often reasonable and correct, if anti-dumping measures restrict EU companies' pursuit of reasonable profits, or ignore the EU's energy conservation policies in the case of China's energy-saving lamps, they will backfire.

Chen Lipeng, director of the Guangdong Fair Trade Bureau, has participated in many discussions and consultations with the European Trade Commission.

He disclosed that since last year, the European Commission has received many applications for anti-dumping investigations to related industries in China. "But they were all crushed," the reason is that it is difficult to settle various interests. The frequency of anti-dumping in September also represents the pressure from EU manufacturers.