Report on EU trade defence: effective protection against unfair trade

report

The main highlights of the report include a major overhaul of EU trade defence legislation, continued high EU trade defence activity, resolute action to safeguard EU steel producers and strong and continuous defence of EU exporters targeted in foreign investigations. Since November 2014, the Juncker Commission put in place 95 trade defence measures. Two-thirds of all the 135 measures in place concern imports from China. Commenting on the report, President of the European Commission Jean-Claude Juncker said:"We are open traders, but we cannot afford to be naïve. Not all of our trade partners want to play by the same rules that we do – we must not be taken advantage of and must protect the EU, its companies and its workers against unfair trading practices. Our intense work in this field in the past few years bears fruit: we have now in place tools that are better-suited for today's global economy and we will continue working to ensure our companies and workers are shielded from any unfair practices.” Commissioner for Trade Cecilia Malmström said: “Open economies need effective tools to enforce fair competition, especially at a time where some countries don't want to play by the rules. This report shows that our trade defence team is working harder than ever to safeguard jobs and protect the EU from unfair trade practices around the world. Thanks to our recent reforms, we are able to act quicker and our tools are more suited to the current global economic challenges.” EU trade defence measures provide welcome relief to European companies. In some cases, the duties resulted in a decrease of unfairly priced imports of up to 99%. At the same time, the duties are set at a level that is sufficient to restore competitive conditions on the EU market, without overburdening EU consumer and industries that rely on imports. For more information see the full press release and a detailed supplement to the report.