China negotiates on two trade investigations recently launched by the US

On April 27, Vice Minister of China's Ministry of Commerce Zhong Shan met with Dan Piccuta, Chargé d'affaires of the Embassy of the United States of America, to negotiate on two trade remedy investigations targeting Chinese-made products that US industries recently filed with the US government.

Zhong said the Chinese government has always valued the China-US economic and trade relations, whose healthy and normal development is in line with the two nation's long-term interest. However, US industries have recently filed for trade remedy investigations into Chinese-made oil well tubing and tire products. China is paying close attention to the matter, as the cases involved a large sum of money and affected numerous Chinese enterprises.

Zhong stressed that in the current situation in which efforts are being made around the globe to cope with the financial crisis, it is inappropriate to put forward the two applications. If they were improperly handled, serious problems could occur, which would not only be harmful to the settlement of bilateral economic and trade issues between China and the US, but also generate a negative impact on the recovery and development of the global economy.

He stated that China's domestic industries are also facing a huge impact from many products imported from the US and the Chinese government is under huge pressure from its domestic industries. Even if US could exclude Chinese goods from the US market by means of trade remedy measures, the US domestic industries would not necessarily get out of trouble.

China does not want to see intensifying bilateral trade frictions, which is unfavorable to both China and the US. It wishes that, from the point of view of the general situation of China-US economic and trade relations, the US would properly handle trade frictions and fight trade protectionism by taking a positive attitude.

Zhong also stressed that the governments of the two countries should handle problems encountered in bilateral economic and trade relations through a closer cooperation. The results achieved from the proper handling of trade frictions by the US as the largest economy in the world and China as the largest developing country will make a great contribution to the world. Industries from the two countries should strengthen their negotiations to solve trade problems in the form of cooperation. The US should not adopt trade remedy measures or apply unfair rules against China as a means to restrict exports of Chinese products.

Piccuta said, the US values the China-US economic and trade relations and believes that the sound development of the China-US economic and trade relations conforms to the long-term interests of the two countries. The US is aware of China's concern about the cases and is willing to maintain further negotiation and cooperation with China in the investigation procedures and deal with the trade friction in a mature and pragmatic way.

On April 8, 2009, US' steel pipeline enterprises and relevant associations officially filed an application with the US Department of Commerce and International Trade Commission, requesting for an anti-dumping and anti-countervailing investigation into the oil well tubing products exported from China.

On April 20, United Steelworkers filed an application with the United States International Trade Commission (USITC) for a special protection investigation into China-made pneumatic passenger car tires. The applicants claimed that the exports of such Chinese products to the US has soared over the past several years, with a 215 percent increase in export volume for the period from 2004 to 2008, and a 295 percent increase in export value. This has disturbed the market of relevant US industries, so they request the US administration to impose an import quota of 21 million tires per year on Chinese-made passenger car tires.

According to US statistics, China exported 46 million Chinese-made passenger vehicle tires to the US in 2008 for a value of more than 1.7 billion USD. The USITC will announce its acceptance of the case within 7 days of the filing, and initiate the investigation.

Source: People's Daily Online