Brussels and Beijing have agreed to cooperate on trade and competition after the two sides set up a dialogue on state aid.
The EU’s executive arm represented by the Commissioner for Competition
Margrethe Vestager,
met Chinese officials in Beijing on 15 November for the first time
since they signed a memorandum of understanding in June, to enter into a
new dialogue between the EU and China.
Relations have been fraught because of EU efforts to
resist dumping of steel by Chinese companies receiving unfair state aid,
but it seems that according to the European Commission, China agreed on
it as important to cooperate to ensure good economic relations with the
bloc.
Commissioner Vestager said that it is of both EU and
China’s interest to cooperate to promote fair global competition.
"Antitrust, merger review and State aid control are important tools in
ensuring that consumers can benefit from competitive markets and
companies can compete on their merits. Both the European Commission and
the Chinese competition agencies will work closely together for a
coherent and efficient competition enforcement.”
Vestager further added that the cooperation of both sides
on state aid is important to prevent public policies from restricting
competition or distorting the market. In this context, Vestager welcomed
China’s adoption of a Fair Competition Review System designed to ensure
State measures do not adversely affect market entry and exit and the
free movement of goods.
The next step of this new dialogue is the Commission’s
meeting at a technical level with the 28 ministries in charge of
implementing the Fair Competition Review System in China. This
cooperation between the EU and China will continue and both sides agreed
to take stock of the dialogue at the next EU-China Summit in 2018.
https://www.neweurope.eu/article/eu-achieves-progress-talks-china-steel-dumping/