The Chinese Commerce Ministry’s initial investigation showed that U.S. companies had dumped chicken products into the Chinese market, according to the ministry’s website (www.mofcom.gov.cn).

The preliminary tariffs were announced a day after Beijing requested a World Trade Organization ruling on European Union duties on shoes made in China in the latest case demonstrating China’s use of the WTO to keep markets open to the exports on which it depends.

The United States Trade Representative was muted in its response, saying it would consult with U.S. producers as it analyzed China’s move.

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Post tags: anti-dumping, imports, U.S. trade
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At a meeting with Senate Democrats, Mr Obama was asked whether the US would cut ties with Beijing over ongoing trade disputes.

The president said he would continue to make sure that China and other countries lived up to abide by trade agreements, but warned it would be a mistake for the US to become protectionist.

“The approach that we’re taking is to try to get much tougher about the enforcement of existing rules, putting constant pressure on China and other countries to open up their markets in reciprocal ways,” he said.

“But what I don’t want to do is for us as a country or as a party, to shy away from the prospects of international competition.”

Watch the full video of Obama’s meeting via C-SPAN. A question about China is the first one asked:

See also “Currency Dispute Likely to Further Fray U.S.-China Ties” and “Who Needs Whom More?” by Philip Bowring, both from the New York Times.

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Post tags: U.S. relations, U.S. trade
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A unit of state-owned China Precision Machinery Import-Export Corp., for example, has made nearly 300 illegal shipments to U.S. firms since a ban was imposed on CPMIEC and its affiliates in mid-2006, according to an analysis of shipping records by the Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control, a nonprofit proliferation watchdog.

A Wall Street Journal review of the records and interviews with officials at some of the American companies indicate that the U.S. firms likely were unaware they were doing business with banned entities, and in many cases were tripped up by altered company names.

The CPMIEC shipments, worth millions of dollars, include everything from anchors and drilling equipment to automobile parts and toys. In many cases, CPMIEC acted as a shipping intermediary — activity also banned under a 2006 presidential order.

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Post tags: arms embargo, Iran, U.S. trade, weapons exports
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Copyright piracy in China remains at “unacceptably high levels,” causing “serious harm” to American businesses, the top US trade official said in an annual report to Congress Tuesday.

US Trade Representative Ron Kirk said in the mandatory report on China’s compliance with its World Trade Organization accession obligations that Beijing was not taking adequate steps to enforce intellectual property rights laws.

He said enforcement of China’s copyright protection “remains a significant challenge.”

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Post tags: copyright, IPR, U.S. trade
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World Trade Organization judges rejected a Chinese appeal of a ruling that held its restrictions on the sale of books, films and music from the U.S. illegal.

The 183-page decision, issued today by the WTO’s Appellate Body in Geneva, may force China to liberalize imports or face possible sanctions.

It followed an Aug. 12 finding by a WTO panel that China violated free-trade commitments by requiring importers to channel foreign publications and audiovisual products through state-run companies. The panel urged China to allow foreign companies to sell music over the Internet, which would be a boon for Apple Inc., with its iTunes software.

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Post tags: media access, media control, U.S. trade, WTO
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Obama is using the trip to redefine the U.S. relationship with Asia from its biggest debtor and largest single buyer of consumer goods to a more balanced partnership that can help bring down a 10.2 percent jobless rate. To do so, he’ll have to convince China’s President Hu Jintao and other leaders that tariffs on Chinese tires and steel don’t portend the future.

“The challenge Obama is facing is that the influence of the U.S. is rapidly waning and that he has little credibility” on trade issues, said Marc Faber, who manages about $300 million in Asian shares at Hong Kong-based Marc Faber Ltd. “Obama talked about free trade, but recently the U.S. slapped tariffs on Chinese-made tire imports.”

Obama needs to show the same commitment to free trade as his predecessor, George W. Bush, Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak said during a Nov. 13 panel discussion in Singapore. Mexican President Felipe Calderon suggested the U.S. has become more protectionist and less engaged internationally since the Sept. 11 terror attacks.

Also from Reuters:

The United States and China sparred over exchange rates at a meeting of Asia Pacific leaders on Sunday, pointing to tricky talks ahead for President Barack Obama when he flies to China to address economic tensions.

The discord surfaced at a summit of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum in Singapore when a reference to “market-oriented exchange rates” was cut from a communique issued at the end of two days of talks. An APEC delegation official said Washington and Beijing could not agree on the wording.

And from the New York Times:

The president and his advisers, including Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, are expected to discuss a wide range of issues with China’s leaders, including North Korea, terrorism, the environment, human rights and the fragile state of the global economy.

The president is expected to praise Beijing for its efforts to stimulate its economy, aiding a global recovery that is now gathering steam. But he is also expected to press Beijing to allow its currency to appreciate and to speed up market reforms and give American companies greater access to its market, which could bolster American exports and help create jobs in the United States.

The three-day visit to China comes after the president traveled to Japan and Singapore, where on Sunday he attended an Asia-Pacific economic summit meeting. During those stops, President Obama pledged to forge closer ties with Japan, a longtime ally, and in a speech in Tokyo said that he did not fear China’s rise but welcomed it.

Update: Read more about the economic relationship between China and the United States in light of Obama’s visit:

- “China, U.S. stuck in mutual reliance” from the Washington Post
- “Obama looks to reset China ties” from Al Jazeera
- “China’s Sprint for the Gold” from the New York Times
- “China’s Role as Lender Alters Obama’s Visit” from the New York Times
- “While U.S. Economy Struggles, China’s Rises” from NPR
- “Mutual interests bind Chinese, U.S. economies” from the Los Angeles Times

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Post tags: apec, Obama China visit 2009, U.S. trade
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The United States is going out of its way to build a warmer economic relationship with China and the strategy seems to be paying early dividends.

In the past two weeks, China has endorsed a U.S.-backed commitment to rebalance the global economy, and impressed some European officials by backing up the pledge with specific steps it planned to take to reconfigure its own economy.

In addition, what looked like it could have been the start of a trade war when the United States imposed tariffs on Chinese tires fizzled out with minimal drama.

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U.S. labor and manufacturing groups urged President Barack Obama on Tuesday to live up to his campaign rhetoric and formally label China a currency manipulator in a Treasury Department report due out next week.

But Nicholas Lardy, a China economic policy watcher at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, said he’d be “shocked” if Obama took that step now.

Obama faces his second decision on the currency issue in a semi-annual report due to Congress on October 15.

During last year’s campaign, Obama criticized then-President George W. Bush for repeatedly failing to label Beijing a currency manipulator, but then made the same decision in his first stab at the issue in April.

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Post tags: currency, U.S. trade, Yuan rate
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China’s imports, up 68 percent in five years, now amount to almost one-third of gross domestic product, according to World Bank data. The nation’s demand for foreign products is a boon for American companies, which exported $351 billion to China in the past five years.

U.S. President Barack Obama’s 35 percent tariff on tires from China spurred a Chinese investigation into prices of U.S. poultry and car products. Dangers of further escalation may be mitigated by the increasing benefit China provides the world economy. Poised to surpass Japan as No. 2 in GDP, its purchasing power is a lure to firms seeking new customers.

Read also an editorial from the Washington Post:

In the name of protecting jobs in the U.S. tire industry, the president has effectively imposed a tax on tires for every American — and a particularly regressive tax at that, since the impact will fall most heavily on the cheap tires that China makes and that lower-income Americans buy.

This is not the second coming of the Smoot-Hawley bill, the notorious 1930 tariff act that exacerbated the Great Depression. Mr. Obama acted under authority China itself had acceded to as part of gaining U.S. agreement to its membership in the World Trade Organization. It affects a narrow range of traded goods. And China’s retaliation so far remains within the framework of international trade law. Mr. Obama says that this step will bolster free trade in the long run by showing that the United States intends to enforce trade agreements. That demonstration will, he implies, strengthen public trust in open markets.

The question is: Exactly what is he doing to advance additional market-opening agreements that are clearly in the U.S. interest, such as pending deals with Colombia, South Korea and Panama?

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Post tags: tires, U.S. trade
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Just two days after the decision by the United States to levy heavy import tariffs on Chinese tires, the government here has reacted by launching an anti-dumping and anti-subsidies investigation into automotive and chicken exports from the US.

The Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) Sunday did not label it as retaliation against the tire dispute, but said it acted simply in a response to domestic concerns.

The probe, which is in line with World Trade Organization (WTO) rules, follows complaints from Chinese manufacturers that US-made products entered the nation’s markets with “unfair competition” and harmed domestic industries, said the ministry in a statement.

MOFCOM added it is still opposed to trade protectionism and committed to working towards global economic recovery.

See also “US tyre duties spark clash” from the Financial Times.

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Post tags: imports, tires, U.S. trade
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