Anti dumping

Published on 09/07/2026 – 17:14 GMT+2•Updated
17:19

The European Commission launched an investigation on Thursday into Chinese Peking duck after several EU producers complained of unfairly low prices harming their industry.

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Without disclosing their names, the Commission said that five EU producers had complained that China is unfairly subsidising domestic production via its five-year plan for agricultural modernisation.

The probe comes at a time of heightened tensions between Beijing and Brussels, as the EU seeks to shield its market from cheap Chinese imports, triggering Beijing’s ire as it aims to preserve access to the lucrative European market.

After China repeatedly threatened retaliation over several EU legislative proposals restricting access to EU public procurement and setting strict conditions on foreign investment, the two sides started negotiations last week to ease tensions.

However, the EU’s latest move targeting duck imports could disrupt the talks by hitting China’s agricultural sector for the first time.

It also said that the volume and prices of imports had a “negative impact on the quantities sold, the level of prices charged and market share held by the Union industry,” and that this had resulted in “substantial adverse effects on the overall performance” of the sector.

The Commission’s investigation could result in anti-dumping duties being imposed on Chinese producers to protect the EU market.

Anti-dumping and anti-subsidy duties are among the EU’s main trade defence instruments against China’s aggressive push into its market. However, EU leaders gave the Commission a mandate in June to step up efforts to reduce the EU’s €1 billion-a-day trade deficit with China. They want the EU executive, which has competence over trade policy, to review its trade defence tools and pursue a dialogue with Beijing that delivers tangible results.

EU Trade Commissioner Maroš Šefčovič met his Chinese counterpart, Wang Wentao, in Brussels last Monday to kick-start negotiations aimed at restoring a level playing field and addressing trade imbalances, which Brussels said had become “unsustainable”.

The EU already imposed tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles in 2024, triggering China’s investigations and sanctions targeting EU brandy, pork and dairy products.

The EU hopes to achieve a breakthrough in negotiations with Beijing by October, when Šefčovič is due to travel to China.

Published on
15/04/2026 – 11:25 GMT+2

The European Commission on Wednesday imposed anti-dumping duties on glass fibre —a key input for the EU’s renewable industry— produced by Chinese companies operating in Egypt, Bahrain and Thailand.

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The move confirms the EU’s push to curb Chinese imports entering the bloc via Belt and Road routes to sidestep tariffs on products officially labelled “made in China.”

Brussels seeks to shield its market from a surge of low-cost imports from the Asian giant, targeting goods it considers heavily subsidized or sold in the EU below production cost in China.

The tariffs on glass fibre from the three countries will range from 11% to 25.4% of the product’s value.

“The investigation confirms the existence of unfair practice, which is an important signal,” Ludovic Piraux, President of Glass Fibre Europe, said.

But he added that the measures adopted “remain insufficient to fully address the predatory strategies pursued through these investments in third countries.”

Job losses loom

China has invested $1 trillion through the Belt and Road initiative – a large-scale infrastructure programme which replaced the former silk road initiative and is aimed at strengthening connectivity, trade and communication across Eurasia, Latin America and Africa. The programme spans more than 150 countries, supporting infrastructure, transport, raw materials extraction and the relocation of industries and state-owned enterprises abroad.

As early as 2010, following an industry complaint, the Commission imposed anti-dumping duties on Chinese glass fibre imports. In the years that followed, Chinese producers established factories in Bahrain and Egypt, from which exports to the EU resumed.

By 2024, glass fibre imports from those countries, along with Thailand, accounted for 24% of the EU market. Egyptian imports alone reached 18%, with Glass Fibre Europe warning the situation could worsen.

This is not the first time the Commission has targeted Chinese products made in third countries under Belt and Road arrangements. It has previously imposed measures on aluminium foil from Thailand and glass fibre produced in Türkiye.

European glass fibre manufacturers have been pushing for action for more than a decade, alongside unions seeking to protect jobs in the sector.

The complaint which lead to Wednesday’s anti-dumping duties was first reported by Euronews in January 2025.

The industry directly employs more than 4,500 workers in the EU and says it supports hundreds of thousands of indirect jobs along the value chain.

Judith Kirton-Darling, General secretary of industriAll Europe, warned that “in the longer term”, the situation could worsen if the EU does not take “a stronger” stance on Chinese dumping.

“It is more than likely that we will face plant closures in Europe which will fundamentally undermine our industry,” she said.