Brussels, 17/02/2012 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission, which will soon unveil its mechanism for reciprocity in the opening-up of third country public procurement markets, is pressing China on this with increasing insistence. The day after the EU-China summit, Commissioner De Gucht showed he was determined to gain the opening-up of access to the public procurement market in China, a market that is worth $1,000 billion annually.
During his visit to Hong Kong on 16 February in the wake of the EU-China summit when the question of trade disputes was largely eclipsed by the subject of Chinese support in addressing the eurozone debt crisis, De Gucht reminded Beijing of Europe's main expectations on the opening of public procurement markets in particular, which accounts for 17% of the global economy. “In many countries, this market is only partially open to foreign competition. To give just one example, only 5% of public procurement concerning metro networks in the EU's top 12 trading partners is legally open to competition under international agreements”, De Gucht said, adding: “Not so in the European Union, which has one of the most open procurement markets in the world”. Public contracts make up 25% of the EU's GDP, and accounts for 31 million jobs. Also, the revised government procurement agreement (GPA) at the WTO, concluded in December 2011, which provides for greater opening of a number of European public markets, provides “huge business opportunities” for Chinese firms in the railway and building sectors. On the other hand, De Gucht found it harder to explain the barriers “EU exporters face when they try to compete on procurement markets abroad”. Although, he said, “China is certainly not the only country where there are problems … problems there definitely are”. He deplored the fact that EU companies have access to “only a small fraction” of a €830 billion market (7 trillion yuan). A recent study by the EU Chamber of Commerce in China highlights problems regarding access to information on calls for tenders, inequitable implementation of calls for tenders, and an insufficient tendering mechanism, the commissioner explained, also regretting that, when it comes to infrastructure which is the key component of public procurement, “new projects are frequently carried out through state-owned enterprises and therefore by definition are not open to competition”. Furthermore, De Gucht said: “It is in response to this type of imbalance that I am finalising, together with my colleague in charge of the internal market, Commissioner Barnier, a proposal for a new instrument to encourage open markets for procurement around the world”. The project is to be unveiled in March. (EH/transl.jl)