Chinese Exports Worry the West
BEIJING — China’s factory exports are powering ahead, putting jobs around the world in jeopardy and setting off a backlash that is gaining momentum.
From steel and cars to consumer electronics and solar panels, Chinese factories are finding more overseas buyers. The world’s appetite for its goods is welcomed by China, which is enduring a severe downturn in what had been the economy’s biggest driver of growth: building and outfitting apartments. But other countries are increasingly concerned that China’s rise is coming partly at their expense, and are starting to take action.
The European Union announced recently that it was preparing to charge tariffs on all electric cars arriving from China. The European Union said it had found substantial evidence that Beijing has been illegally subsidizing these exports, which China denies.
China produces a third of the world’s manufactured goods, more than the United States, Germany, Japan and South Korea combined, according to the United Nations Industrial Development Organization.
The European Union has also been mulling import restrictions on wind turbines and solar panels from China. India announced last year that it would impose broad tariffs on steel from China. And Turkey says China is sending it exports while buying little.
The United States has imposed an ever-lengthening list of restrictions on American high-tech exports. “I’ve made sure that the most advanced American technologies can’t be used in China,” President Joseph R. Biden Jr. said in his State of the Union address.
China has found ways to bypass some tariffs. Chinese components go in rising volumes to countries like Vietnam and Mexico. These countries process the goods, so that they
count as their own products. These countries then ship the goods to the United States and European Union, which charge them low tariffs or none.
Europe also will soon phase in a tax on imports from all over the world based on the quantity of climate-changing carbon dioxide emitted during their production. The new tax will fall heavily on imports from China. Two-thirds of the electricity in China is generated by burning heavily polluting coal.
Europe and the United States also face threats from China to their relationships in developing countries, which increasingly choose cheaper Chinese goods. Across much of Latin America and Africa, countries now buy more from China than nearby industrial democracies, and the United States and Europe can do little about it.
“There are no rules to stop dumped and subsidized products from undercutting your exports to the rest of the world,” said Susan C. Schwab, who was United States trade representative under President George W. Bush.
Tariffs and more to counter a growing trade threat.