Sun Huaibin, spokesman for the China Textile Industry Council,
on Friday expressed welcome to the ongoing China-EU talks on
Chinese textile products blocked at the customs in EU
countries.
The current Sino-EU trade consultation in Beijing is an urgent
contact between the two sides to solve internal market crises in
the European Union, Sun told Xinhua in an exclusive interview.
Currently, millions of dollars-worth of clothing items shipped
from China to Europe in excess of their quotas have been blocked at
customs of some European countries.
China and EU reached an agreement this June, setting new quotas
on ten categories of textile products from China. But the quotas
have been filled rapidly as many EU importers and retailers had
ordered large quantity of goods from China several months before
the new quotas were set.
The EU is under fierce pressure from fashion importers and
European retailers to review quotas.
On Wednesday an EU trade team headed by Fritz-Harald Wenig
arrived in Beijing to try to resolve the problem of Chinese textile
exports blocked at the customs in EU countries.
Both Lu Jianhua, director of the Foreign Trade Department of
China's Ministry of Commerce, and Fritz-Harald Wenig, had "earnest
negotiations" over the issue, the ministry said in a statement late
Thursday.
"This shows under conditions of free trade, it is unreasonable
to adjust international trade though quota limit, a kind of
factitious method of planning," Sun said.
"The negotiation itself indicates that trade quota is a
double-edge sword, which can not only refrain export, but do harm
to importers as well," he said.??
(Xinhua News Agency August 27, 2005)