On Wednesday 11 October, the member state ambassadors to the EU approved the political agreement, concluded between the Estonian Presidency of the EU Council, the negotiators of the European Parliament and European Commission on 3 October, on the new EU methodology for calculating anti-dumping duties. This is based on an assessment of market distortions in third countries where state intervention in the economy is significant.
These new rules will maintain the EU's capacity to protect its producers against unfair trade practices. They aim at detecting and redressing cases where prices of imported products are artificially lowered due to state intervention.
In particular, the new rules are aimed at settling the issue of how to treat China in EU anti-dumping investigations now that the arrangements on this have expired (in December 2016) in China's WTO accession protocol (see EUROPE 11780).
The new methodology is neutral with regard to third countries and it fully complies with the EU's WTO obligations by removing the previous distinction between market and non-market economies in the anti-dumping calculation. The Commission will instead have to prove the existence of a significant market distortion between a product's sale price and its production cost.
On this basis, it will be allowed to set a price for the product by referring, for example, to the price of the good in a country with similar levels of economic development or to relevant undistorted international costs and prices.
The Commission will also draw up specific reports describing distortions in countries or sectors. As in current practice, EU companies will have to lodge complaints – but they will be able to use the Commission reports to justify their case.
The text approved by the ambassadors will be submitted to the European Parliament and Council of Ministers in the coming weeks for formal adoption. It will enter into force the day after its publication in the Official Journal of the EU. (Original version in French by Emmanuel Hagry)