China's footwear industry faces greater trade protection pressure

Although Germany has not yet announced its export data for the entire year of 2009, according to the current situation, it is a foregone conclusion that China has surpassed Germany as the world’s largest exporter. However, the “export first” laurels did not give China much joy, as it is likely to face more, greater, and more diversified trade protectionist risks.

The German Federal Bureau of Statistics announced earlier this month that in the first 11 months of 2009, German exports totaled approximately 1.05 trillion U.S. dollars, while China’s exports for the same period amounted to 1.07 trillion U.S. dollars; German foreign trade agencies forecast that Germany’s annual exports in 2009 will be 1.17 trillion US dollars, and China's exports in 2009 actually exceeded 1.2 trillion US dollars.

The greatest protectionist pressure China faces is most likely to come from the United States. The U.S. Department of Commerce initially ruled on January 6 that anti-dumping duties of 43% to 289% would be levied on wire mesh trays imported from China, which was considered by the industry as the beginning of a new year's trade friction between China and the United States.

In 2009, the United States began to step up trade protectionism measures against China, including imposing anti-dumping tariffs of up to 99.14% on oil pipelines and anti-dumping measures against China in tires, seamless steel tubes, antimony chloride, and ironing boards. . In addition, there are a series of trade protectionist measures in the making.

Roger Scharling, an attorney who participated in the US-China trade friction case lawsuit, believes that in 2010, there was a fertile ground for “substantial increase in anti-dumping and countervailing litigation cases”. Krugman, the Nobel Prize winner in economics, recently defended the protectionism of the United States and encouraged the United States to launch large-scale trade confrontation with China.

Chinese economists believe that protectionist measures against China are "absurd." Zuo Xiaolei (blog), chief economist at Galaxy Securities, pointed out that the United States’ huge trade deficit with China was caused by itself. "The United States' reluctance to sell high-tech products to China is the main reason for its large deficit."

Another huge trade protectionist pressure will come from the European Union. On December 22 last year, the EU finally decided to extend the anti-dumping duty on Chinese-made leather shoes for another 15 months. In the past few months, the European Union has launched anti-dumping investigations on China’s steel wire rods, seamless steel tubes, sodium gluconate, steel cables, and aluminum alloy wheels.

Since November 2008, China has suffered more than 100 trade protectionist barriers, accounting for one-third of the protectionist measures taken by various countries and regions in the world and ranking first in the world. According to statistics from the Ministry of Commerce of the People's Republic of China, the number of trade frictions involving Chinese products in 2009 alone exceeded 100, involving a total amount of approximately US$12 billion, both of which have doubled over the same period.

In addition, developing countries such as Argentina, India, Brazil, and Mexico also initiated anti-dumping and countervailing investigations on Chinese products, involving various products such as methyl chloride, centrifugal pumps, screw compressors, and hypodermic syringes.

Statistics from the UK Trade Research Institute show that the current number of discriminatory trade laws in the world will far exceed the free trade bill, showing a one-sided situation of 6:1. More than 90% of the world's trade products will be subject to trade protection measures to a certain extent. influences.

Trade protection measures have caused great damage to China's related industries. Wei Yafei, director of the China Leather Association's shoe-shoe travel shoe professional committee, said that since the EU imposed anti-dumping duties in 2006, China has reduced its exports of about 40 million pairs of shoes to the EU. This alone has caused the unemployment of about 20,000 Chinese workers.

Trade protectionism has forced consumers in Europe and the United States to spend higher prices on goods. Lin Yifu, deputy governor of the World Bank, stated in New York on the 7th that restricting China’s exports to the United States would not benefit the interests of U.S. consumers and would not help solve the U.S. trade imbalance. If the United States imports from other countries and regions, the cost will only be higher.

Experts from the University of International Business and Economics Zhang Jun (blog) believe that with the expansion of the export scale, China's external trade risks will always increase. He pointed out that China’s labor cost advantage will continue for a long time, and high value-added products will not be able to dominate exports in the short term.

"Only when China's industrial structure is adjusted will the protection protectionism risk faced by the country be improved, but it will not disappear. It will always exist." Zhang Junsheng said.