Tag: trade barriers

High-level delegations from the EU and the United States will meet next week (13 May) for talks on eliminating remaining regulatory obstacles hampering trade and investment between the two economic giants. A long-standing poultry dispute between the two sides is topping the agenda. 

European biodiesel manufacturers have filed an official complaint to the Commission regarding "unfair" US biodiesel subsidies, substantiating expectations that biofuels could be at the heart of the next large-scale trade spat at the WTO.

Parliament has adopted a package of measures to enhance free trade within the bloc after it emerged that many member states are blocking imports of specific products from other EU countries on the basis that they do not meet particular national technical standards.

The Commission has launched an investigation into imports of steel from China, South Korea and Taiwan, which European steelmakers have complained are being dumped on the market at below cost price, putting thousands of jobs at stake.

Commission Vice-President Günter Verheugen will today (9 November) lead a high-level delegation to the United States for talks on eliminating remaining regulatory obstacles hampering trade and investment between the two economic giants. The two sides hope to strike a deal on a number of key issues, including common standards for biofuels trading. 

The European Commission has announced that it will not renew limits imposed more than two years ago on textiles and clothing from China after a dramatic surge in low-cost imports from the Asian giant threatened to cause serious damage to the European manufacturing industry. 

European competitiveness ministers have reached agreement on a new set of rules for exporting within the EU that should cut the red tape currently holding business back from cross-bloc trading.

Multilateral liberalisation of trade should be the centre of European trade strategy, argues Patrick Messerlin – professor of economics, Sciences Po - in a new paper for the European Centre for International Political Economy. The recent shift in European trade policy to negotiate bilateral agreements is taking Europe into dangerous waters, he believes.

Just as EU and US leaders have agreed to a new transatlantic economic partnership, Barbara Böttcher and Klaus Deutsch of Deutsche Bank provide recommendations on how the two economic giants can deepen economic co-operation.

The European Commission is planning tougher action to prise open new markets for its companies in China, India and Russia, saying countries that fail to remove trade barriers will face further legal battles.

The Commission wants to boost trade between EU countries by making it more difficult for member states to block imports of specific products on the basis that they do not meet particular national standards.

Top EU and US officials have agreed to identify key areas where they can reduce regulatory barriers to trade and investment that businesses say cost euro-millions.

The EU's Trade chief has presented a "modernised" trade strategy which sets business competitiveness as its main objective. 

EU Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson has announced that he is to recommend the imposition of anti-dumping duties on leather shoes imported from China and Vietnam.

With pullovers, trousers, blouses, T-shirts, bras and yarns made in China and worth hundreds of millions of euro blocked in warehouses, the Commission is under growing pressure to come up with a solution fast.