BRUSSELS, Belgium – Last Tuesday, a report emerged in Brussels on a draft proposal prepared by the investigators who carry out the anti-dumping and anti-subsidy investigations that relate to imports of electric bicycles from China. This draft proposal indicates that the European Union is to impose an overall combined anti-dumping and anti-subsidy duty of 79.3 percent on the import of e-bikes made in China.

MLex reported that it has seen this draft proposal. MLex is an independent media organization providing exclusive market insight, analysis and commentary on regulatory risk. This media organization is linked to LexisNexis, the world’s database on legal information owned by the RELX Group, previously known as ReedElesevier.

Anti-subsidy tariffs

According to the MLex report the draft proposal speaks of anti-subsidy tariffs of up to 16.4 percent that is to be imposed on the e-bike export of Giant, Fuji-Ta, Geoby and other electric-bike makers in China.

Overall duty rate

The MLex report also states “The commission has drafted five-year anti-subsidy duties of up to 16.14 percent, with some companies facing lower tariffs. This includes Bodo Vehicle Group with tariffs of 13.3 percent, Giant Electric Vehicle with 3.86 percent and Jinhua Vision Industry with 7.96 percent. Trade officials have also cut the overall duty rate that Chinese e-bike makers will face, by tweaking the level of injury caused to the EU industry from 83.6 percent to 79.3 percent. Under old EU trade rules — which apply to this case — combined dumping and countervailing measures cannot exceed the level of injury the EU industry feels from the unfair pricing methods.”

Final disclosure letter

The draft proposal that has been prepared by the investigators who carried out the anti-dumping and anti-subsidy investigations will form the basis of the so-called “final disclosure letter” that the European Commission will send to stakeholders and parties which have co-operated in the proceedings. These stakeholders and parties that co-operated have up to 26 November, 2018 to return their comments on the final disclosure. The deadline for imposing definitive measures (the combined anti-subsidy and anti-dumping duty) stand at 19 January, 2019.