A phone call decides the success of China-EU PV negotiations

Due to the "price promise" agreement with China, some Chinese PV companies will be exempt from high anti-dumping duties. On August 3, the European Commission formally issued an official announcement and decided to accept China’s “price commitment”. The Chinese Ministry of Commerce welcomed this, which indicates that China-Europe’s largest trade friction in the history of the dispute has been temporarily resolved through negotiations. Many media commentaries believe that Premier Li Keqiang has played a crucial role in the successful negotiations between China and the EU.

"If I didn't call the prime minister, I'm afraid it's still hanging."

Researcher Bai Mingnan, a researcher at the Ministry of Commerce's International Trade and Economic Cooperation Research Institute, said that before the Sino-European trade contacts, the specific negotiations for individual products rose to the level of the Prime Minister was extremely rare.

As early as May of this year when Li Keqiang visited Switzerland, he published a signed article in the "New Zurich", emphasizing the principle of "one insistence and two resoluteness": that is, persist in negotiating solutions to problems, firmly oppose trade protectionism, and resolutely safeguard our country. Business interests. These three principles have been well implemented in future negotiations.

Li Keqiang later said in a visit to Germany that these practices of trade protectionism have sent a wrong signal to the international community and harmed people against themselves. China firmly opposes this. We advocate the proper settlement of trade frictions through dialogue and consultation, and firmly safeguard the liberalization and facilitation of world trade and investment.

On the evening of June 3, Li Keqiang said during a meeting with the European Commission and Barroso that if the case is not handled well, it will not only affect the interests of Chinese and European companies, but it may also trigger a trade war. There is no winner in the trade war, and it is hoped that China and the EU will proceed from the overall situation and resolve trade disputes through negotiations and negotiations. "If the EU is bent on adopting sanctions, China must inevitably counter it."

In an interview with reporters, Any of Mao Chunchun, the chief of the Economic and Economic Research Center of Tsinghua University, said that the prime minister’s phone calls “have a great effect. If Li Keqiang is not called, it may be suspended.”

Why does the photovoltaic industry need the prime minister to "take the horse"?

Why in the business negotiations of many individual commodities, only the photovoltaic industry needs the "Prime Ministerial Level" to sit on the negotiation table?

According to public information, trade friction between China and the EU was once very severe. In 2011, China exported over 35.8 billion U.S. dollars of photovoltaic products, of which the EU accounted for 60%, involving exports exceeding 20 billion U.S. dollars. The double-counter cases of PV in Europe are considered to be the biggest trade friction between China and Europe so far, and the largest trade dispute in the world, affecting the survival of more than one thousand enterprises in China and the employment of over 400,000 people. It also affects the employment of the EU’s 250,000 people. .

Bai Ming believes that as for an export product, due to the degree of market economy and the status quo in the two countries, similar contradictions often cannot be resolved through several negotiations. However, the Prime Minister’s involvement has elevated this specific event to the height of bilateral relations. “As far as the PV incident itself is concerned, if people do double-acting against you, how can you explain the ability to do so is also very small. However, if you place a large platform for the development of bilateral relations between China and the EU, both China and EU must look at the overall situation and look at the issue of photovoltaics in the overall situation. It may be a good solution."

The annual Sino-U.S. strategic and economic dialogue can also see the involvement of the national leaders in trade issues. *** The exchange rate issue, Sino-U.S. trade deficit, and carbon tariff issues have all been mentioned in previous dialogues. “There are more examples in China and the United States. The involvement of national leaders may be very high in China-EU trade relations. It's rare, especially for a specific issue like photovoltaics,” said Bai Ming.

The European Union continues to investigate China's photovoltaic products In fact, the background of the friction in the photovoltaic industry can be attributed to the status of China's industrial restructuring in recent years. As early as September 6 and November 8, 2012, the European Commission officially launched anti-dumping and countervailing investigations on photovoltaic panels, photovoltaic cells and other photovoltaic modules imported from China.

"China becomes a big trading country and the probability of trade disputes will naturally increase." Bai Ming explained to South. In addition, Europe is eager to recover from the debt crisis in Europe, and the United States has re-industrialized, and to a large extent it will crash with Chinese industries.

Bai Ming believes that on the one hand, due to the economic crisis faced by the European Union, the uncompetitive industries that the developed countries were prepared to phase out have now “kicked up and continued to do it.” There has been an industry backflow, which has coincided with some industries in China. On the other hand, China is undergoing a period of trade transformation and upgrading. The industry has been upgrading from labor-intensive to high-value-added, high-tech, and the industry has reconciled more with the United States and Europe. The coincidence point is the point of conflict.

Although China and the EU temporarily reached a "price promise" agreement and will not adopt temporary taxation measures, the European Commission said yesterday that anti-subsidy investigations on solar cell and related component products from China will continue. The final survey results will be announced by the end of this year.