China and EU to Discuss Bilateral Trade Disputes Next November

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Friday, October 25, 2002

China and EU to Discuss Bilateral Trade Disputes Next November

The increasing trade disputes between China and EU have undoubtedly accelerated the frequency of bilateral contacts. Following EU trade commissioner Pascal Lamy's visit to China a week ago, here we see officials with the State Administration for Entry-Exit Inspection and Quarantine of China (CIQ SA) ready to visit Brussels to meet their EU counterparts at the beginning of next month, expecting to resolve controversial issues in food trade.

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Ban impairs China's agricultural produce exporting

A press officer with the delegation of the European Commission to China, noted in an interview that this meeting is sure to see China and EU get to food safety, especially that of China's aquatic products to EU. Reviewing the past, it is the third negotiation since EU issued a ban on several types of imported product from China last January.

Since EU chilled China's exporting of aquatic products, rabbit meat and honey in somewhat way the beginning of last January the dispute has been carried on for 10 months. The EU side claimed that a prohibitive antibiotic, which is for animals' use only, was found in shrimp imports from China. EU is the fourth major exporting market of China's water products. Although products related to the dispute make up a small portion of the total bilateral trade, the related annual trade volume amounts to 100 million Euros.

Thus, the Chinese side answered back, saying that the ban is unfair, a rising of trade protectionism, and explained meanwhile, that banning cosmetic imports from EU proceeds from health concern, for they might have been polluted by mad-cow-disease-infected animal by-products.

New Sino-EU dialogue mechanism defined during Lamy's China tour

Sources from Beijing-based EU delegation said China and EU are both making efforts to end this long-drawn-out dispute. In the talks during Lamy's visit, both sides agreed that if CIQSA and EU quarantine officials strengthen cooperation, a warning mechanism may be established, so that trade ban can be avoided in future. "We are looking forward to delving out a settlement of the dispute as soon as possible. However, it depends on the negotiation results when to lift the ban, although we hope that contacts in November will bring about a final settlement."

According to incomplete statistics, 91 cases have been put on file for investigation since EU launched anti-dumping towards Chinese products, and over 40 cases are in the course of execution. Though conflicts in Sino-EU bilateral trades crop up frequently, good news is reported too. To begin with, EU has accepted Chinese color TV producers' commitments on price and quantity, which marked the termination of 15-year anti-dumping policy towards Chinese color televisions. Then the European Commission recently proposed to amend regulation 3030/93 and practice special protectionism policy on textile imports from China, and promised to lift restriction on quantity of all textile imports by the end of 2004.

As learned, EU is China's third large trading partner, next only to Japan and the US. Statistics released by China customs show that the bilateral trade volume from January to last August added up to US$54.386 billion, up 8.3 percent over the same period last year, among which the exporting and importing volume reached a respective US$29.593 billion and US$24.794 billion, an increase of 10.7 and 5.5 percent as against the same period last year.

By PD Online Staff Zhu Lizhen

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