China will face a tougher international trade environment as more developing nations join major economies in launching trade complaints, a senior commerce official said in Beijing Friday.

"About 60 percent of trade remedy investigation cases against China have come from developing countries like India, Turkey and South Africa," said deputy trade representative Wang Shichun, also director of the Commerce Ministry's Bureau of Fair Trade in Imports and Exports.

China was subject to 16 anti-dumping complaints by nine countries and regions during the first quarter of this year, with a total trade value of 314 million U.S. dollars, official statistics showed.

After China reached an agreement on textiles with the United States and the European Union last year, friction between China and developing nations on the trade of textile products has intensified, he said.

"Right now, we are still in talks with South Africa and Turkey on this issue," Wang said, adding that a memorandum signed by China and Brazil in March had smoothed out the two countries' dispute over textiles.

"A stable and predictable Sino-Brazilian trade environment has been achieved," he said.

Although disputes were so far confined to labor-intensive products, Wang warned that future disputes could stem from crucial technology, intellectual property rights, or technology standards.

"We take the same stance with all countries whatever the dispute is. When it comes to developing nations, however, we will give more consideration to their development needs," he said.

Wang said a more relaxed attitude and negotiations were often the best way to resolve issues.

To prevent disputes, Wang said the Ministry of Commerce had called on domestic companies to channel more investment into developing nations and provide more technological aid and personnel training.

"Our objective is to help domestic export companies to boost the economies of import nations," Wang said.

The trade volume between China and developing nations reached 705.5 billion U.S. dollars last year, up 24.9 percent year-on-year, accounting for 49.6 percent of China's foreign trade.

Source: Xinhua