On December 19, the EU officially announced the amendments to the new anti-dumping investigation methodology. MOFCOM spokesman made a statement on this.

The spokesman said that China had paid close attention to the progress of the EU’s amending of the new anti-dumping investigation methodology and had repeatedly expressed its concern to the EU. We notice that the EU’s amendments to the anti-dumping laws have abolished the non-market economies’ (NMEs) list to fulfill its obligations under the 15th article of the Protocol on China's accession to the WTO and the EU’s anti-dumping laws would not assume China as a “non-market-economy country”. At the same time, the EU introduced the concept and standard of “significant market distortions”. When confirming the situation of “significant market distortions”, the EU can abandon the exporters’ prices or costs and determine the existence of dumping based on the prices of a third country or international prices. We think the EU’s methodology is against the WTO rules.

The spokesman pointed out that the WTO rules do not include the concept of “significant market distortions” and the rule of social and environmental dumping. The EU’s new anti-dumping investigation methodology cannot be backed up by the WTO rules. The EU continues to use the “surrogate country” approach regardless of the WTO rules and decides the existence of “significant market distortions” of other countries by its own standards. This will weaken the authority of the WTO’s anti-dumping legal system.

The spokesman stressed that as an important member of the WTO, the EU should respect the international rules, and only when the authority of multilateral trade system is safeguarded, it can be beneficial to the common interests of all countries. China urges the EU to strictly stick to the WTO rules, and comprehensively fulfill the international treaties and obligations with goodwill. China reserves its relevant rights under the WTO disputes settlement mechanism, and will protect our legitimate interests with necessary methods.