The Ministry of Commerce backs efforts by Chinese shoemakers to file a lawsuit in the European Court of Justice against the EU decision to impose tariffs on Chinese shoe exports, a ministry official said yesterday.

 

Director Wang Shouwen of the ministry's fair trade department said that it was the enterprises' right to file the suit in order to protect their legitimate interests.

 

The ministry itself, he said, was in talks with relevant departments on whether to take the issue to the WTO.

 

On October 5, the EU announced its decision to reduce the normal five-year anti-dumping term to two years and impose anti-dumping duties of 16.5 percent on Chinese shoemakers.

 

The so-called "one-size-fits-all" anti-dumping tariff has provoked complaints from both the Chinese government and the country's shoe industry, who insist that the EU should take into account the fact that some shoemakers produce low-end products while others cater for the high-end market.

 

The decision contradicts the principle of free and fair trade advocated by the WTO, the ministry said earlier this week.

 

Wang said that Chinese companies could learn two lessons from the EU ruling. First, blind expansion of low value-added exports would only damage the strength of the whole industry. Second, companies must brace themselves for more anti-dumping investigations, collaborate closely with the government, intermediary organizations and overseas importers and learn to defend themselves through legitimate means.

 

With its foreign trade reaching US$1.27 trillion in the first three quarters of the year, China has become increasingly involved in trade disputes.

 

Over the past six years, an annual average of 48 anti-dumping investigations have been lodged against China. There were only six such investigations during the 1980s and only two during the 1970s.

 

Wang said the situation is getting tougher as developing nations start to take restrictive measures against Chinese exports. So far, about 60 percent of anti-dumping investigation cases have been lodged by developing nations like India, Brazil and Turkey.

 

(Xinhua News Agency October 14, 2006)