Divide still clear in build-up to anti-dumping vote
05/11/2009
The 27 member states of the European Union will vote on November 19 on extending anti-dumping duties on imports of leather shoes from China and Vietnam.
Just like last year, when the European Commission announced a formal review of the policy, which first came into force in 2006, big-name brands and retail groups based in northern Europe have been lobbying hard for the extra duties (16% for shoes made in China and 10% for those made in Vietnam) to be abolished.
At the same time, industry groups in countries where footwear production is still significant (mainly Italy, Spain and Portugal) are doing their best to argue the case for keeping the measures in place.
A grouping calling itself the European Footwear Alliance, which represents mainly sports and outdoor brands, said in the build-up to the November 19 vote that a decision to keep the duties in place would take the cost to EU brands and consumers to more than EUR 1 billion. In a statement at the start of November, the organisation said "the European footwear industry" called on member states to put a stop to this "disastrous initiative", which it claimed was the result of "a deeply flawed and politically motivated process". It further claimed: "In its haste to secure an extension of the duties, the Commission has ignored serious factual errors in its findings and abandoned any semblance of due process."
However, it is inaccurate in the extreme for the organisation to suggest that its stance represents the view of the entire European footwear industry.
The president of the Italian Footwear Manufacturers' Association, Vito Artioli, said in October: "Unfair competition is also detrimental to consumers. Far from being damaged by the dreaded price increases caused by customs duties, which are tiny percentages of very low average import prices, in the long run, consumers could lose their ability to choose, suffering the negative consequences of an Asian monopoly."
The problem for consumers, he argued, is that they have to pay for "the profits and the enormous margins" that importers such as those represented in the European Footwear Alliance continue to make by bringing products into the European Union "at prices lower than the prices that the same products would have if sold in the Vietnamese or Chinese markets". This falsely low export price is what the term 'dumping' means.
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