Resignation of EU Commissioner John Dalli: "Consumers and importers fear vacuum in the Commission"

Kehl/Brussels (ots) - Importers: "Planned EU duty on imports of
Chinese tableware hurts the vast majority, including consumers"

European importers of tableware and kitchenware fear a vacuum in
the College of EU Commissioners. At the administrative level the
European Commission plans to impose anti- dumping duties of between
17 and 58 percent on Chinese producers of tableware and kitchenware
which the importers strongly oppose. Such plans were made public by a
Reuters cable on Oct. 11th referring to "EU sources". The
Commissioners still have the power to stop this until 15th November
2012.

"To impose anti-dumping measures would mean to protect very few
market actors at the expense of the vast majority. The unavoidable
consequence would be not only higher prices for the consumers, but
also loss of jobs on the importers´ as well as the retailers´ side ",
says Michael Freiwirth, CEO and owner of the German import firm Arte
Viva. This view is endorsed by a number of European retail businesses
such as Metro as well as organisations like the Foreign Trade
Association (FTA) and the Association of German Retail (AVE).

Freiwirth stresses that even major European producers expressly
oppose the imposition of duties. This is because there is a
substantial number of Community producers who themselves import the
allegedly dumped products from China. The complainants claim to be
supported by 35 percent of European producers which as a whole
account for a market share of just above seven percent.
"Consequently, the complainants represent a market share of around
2.5 percent whereas the market share of products imported from China
account for more than 66 percent", Freiwirth argues.

According to the importers, the whole complaint brought before the
Commission is baseless because Chinese manufacturers sell on their
domestic market at equivalent or even lower prices. Moreover,
according to the Eurostat database the price European importers have
to pay for Chinese products have gone up by nearly 40 percent between
January 2010 and June 2012 - a fact the commission seemingly has not
taken into account.

The importers also emphasize that they serve an entirely different
market segment than the European producers, one that is characterised
by low price products mainly distributed through local retail shops
whereas European producers serve the premium market segment. "The
market we serve will not accept price increases", Freiwirth points
out. "Thus, sales will decrease substantially. At a Commission
hearing the retail group Metro stated that an anti- dumping duty
could easily cost as many as 5000 tableware-related jobs across
Europe just within the Metro group" (Metro being just one of the top
20 retail groups in Europe).

In sum, the planned duties will not resolve the structural
problems which some European producers may have. At the same time
they will definitely jeopardize thousands of jobs in the import and
retail industries.

Contact:
Mr. Michael Freiwirth,
ARTE VIVA GmbH,
Email: office@arteviva.eu;
Tel:0049 177 200 7284