European Parliament opposes lowering EU tariffs on China

The European Parliament signaled it would reject any proposal to lower Europe’s import tariffs against China, highlighting concerns that industries from steel to solar are vulnerable to a flood of Chinese shipments.    The European Parliament signaled it would reject any proposal to lower Europe’s import tariffs against China, highlighting concerns that industries from steel to solar are vulnerable to a flood of Chinese shipments.
   The European Union assembly weighed into the politically charged debate about whether the EU should recognize China as a market economy, a prize sought by Beijing. Such a step would make it more difficult for European manufacturers to win sufficiently high EU duties meant to counter alleged below-cost — or “dumped” — imports from China. That’s because it would force the EU to use Chinese data instead of other nations’ figures to calculate anti-dumping levies against China.
   Under the agreement that led China to join the World Trade Organization in 2001, WTO members pledged to scrap in December 2016 a shortcut for applying a non-market economy standard in calculating anti-dumping duties on China. At the same time, this development won’t grant China blanket status as a market economy.
   In a resolution on Thursday in Strasbourg, France, the 28-nation Parliament said the European Commission should use “a non-standard methodology” in dumping cases involving China until the country fulfills five EU criteria for determining whether trade partners can be considered a market economy. The assembly also said the commission, the EU’s executive arm, should give “full effect” to the scope under China’s WTO deal for applying a non-standard methodology.
   The resolution amounts to a warning shot across the bow of the Brussels-based commission, which is due in July to make a proposal on whether the EU should recognize China as a market economy in dumping cases. European Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmstroem has signaled openness to such a step, which would need to be approved by the EU Parliament and the bloc’s national governments.
   The issue has become a flashpoint in Europe as a sluggish EU economy, excess Chinese production capacity and a struggling European steel industry spark fears of a manufacturing decline and further job losses from the U.K. to Italy.
   China argues that the terms of its WTO accession require recognition of the country as a market economy in dumping cases beginning in December. The U.S. government disagrees and isn’t planning a policy change, risking a Chinese complaint to the global trade arbiter.
   In its resolution on Thursday, the EU Parliament urged the commission “to coordinate with the EU’s major trading partners” on anti-dumping policy toward China after 2016 and “to oppose any unilateral granting of market-economy status to China.”