"Shoe Wars" In Central Europe

The "shoe war" in Central Europe was first ignited by the Spanish shoe burning incident in 2004.

In September, in the Spanish town of etier, more than 400 travellers burned 16 containers and millions of euros worth of shoes from Chinese businessmen.

Shoemaking is one of the traditional industries of echo. The "shoe wars" between China and Europe are mixed with many non-commercial factors, such as nationalistic sentiments induced by the unemployment rate.

"The average unit price of AOKANG's leather shoes exported to the EU now exceeds $20, which is higher than that exported to Brazil, so there is no anti-dumping at all."

In October of this year, Wang Zhentao, chairman of AOKANG group, made this statement to the media.

In July 2007, as the largest private shoe making enterprise in China, AOKANG group took the lead in filing a defense against the first instance court of the European Union.

Non commercial factors affect EU judgments

The EU is not repeating the question of whether to extend anti-dumping duties against Chinese leather shoes.

In October last year, the EU's internal opinions were not consistent with the last defense before this ruling.

In fact, since 2006, Sweden and Denmark have expressed their dissatisfaction with the anti-dumping duty, and think that the tax burden on the European Union is greater.

This phenomenon convinced Pu Lin at that time that China could win a lawsuit.

Pu Ling said in an interview with the newspaper that in November 19th, on behalf of the European Commission's anti-dumping Advisory Committee, the majority of the member states of the European Union agreed to stop the anti-dumping duty. "This result seems to be beneficial to China".

But then the situation took a turn for the worse.

From the end of November to the beginning of December, the European media exaggerated the threat of China's footwear industry to the related industries of the European Union.

Germany, Austria and Malta, the three countries in favour of repealing anti-dumping duties, have changed their positions and expressed abstention.

But in defending against EU anti-dumping, every vote is precious.

The anti-dumping bill in 2006 was passed by a margin of 13 votes to 12 votes.

Pouling said indignantly, "why is this happening? Is this directly related to the law? Is this directly related to the technical problems we are talking about? I'm afraid it's not that simple."

Most of the EU countries have already declined because of their footwear industry. Therefore, cheap Chinese shoes are not only conducive to consumers in these countries, but also to sellers in these countries.

But for the European Union countries such as Spain and Italy, which still exist in the footwear industry, the competitive Chinese products will undoubtedly have a certain impact on the industry which does not conform to the laws of market economy in China.

Thus, in the view of Pu Ling Chen, the imbalance of economic development among the EU countries has mixed some non legal and technological factors into the EU's judgment. "But the balance of interests between countries is not the content of EU's interest clause contained in the twenty-first clause of the EU anti-dumping regulations".

Zhang Youwen, director of the World Economic Research Institute of the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, further pointed out that "China is a big manufacturing country. We need a fair and free international market. Such an international market is also beneficial to other countries, but it may be unfavorable for some interest groups that need to adjust their industrial structure."

China's counterattack

The recent trade frictions between China and Europe are not limited to "shoe wars".

A week ago, the European Commission decided to initiate anti-dumping investigations on China's filament glass fiber.

Three days ago, under the insistence of the European Union, the United States and Mexico, the world trade organization set up an expert group to investigate its allegations of restrictions on the export of Chinese raw materials.

On the 22 day after the EU decided to levy anti-dumping duties on Chinese leather shoes for 15 months, the Chinese Ministry of commerce immediately said it would appeal to the WTO dispute settlement mechanism.

China's response is not just a passive protest.

On the morning of 23 th, the Chinese Ministry of Commerce decided to take provisional anti-dumping measures on the European Union carbon steel fasteners, requiring Chinese importers to provide the Chinese customs with the corresponding margin according to the dumping margin.

Xing Hua, director of the European Union Research Department of the China Institute of international studies, pointed out to our reporter that we did not want to launch trade wars with the European Union, but we should let the EU know that their trade protectionist measures are also not conducive to their interests.

The EU's trade protection measures adopted by our country are very unfair and very unobjective. Therefore, we should take corresponding countermeasures.

In addition to expressing opposition, the Ministry of Commerce will take corresponding measures in trade.

In fact, the aggressive attitude of the European Union in recent trade frictions has to a large extent be attributed to the weak economic situation.

The European Commission recently released a report that the EU and euro area GDP will have negative growth of 4.1% and 4% respectively this year.

The European Union has cut about 4000000 jobs because of the economic crisis.

It is expected that the EU will add about 7000000 new unemployed in the next two years, and the unemployment rate will rise to 10.5%.

Xing said that the prospects for the EU economy are very uncertain.

With the growth of economic disadvantaged factors, the EU is worried about its economic future and its trade protectionist stance will further improve.