G-20 Pushing For Freer Trade, Despite New Duties

24/06/2014 12:00 - 488 Views

Group of Twenty nations initiated 88 new anti-dumping investigations between November 15, 2013, and May 15, 2014, according to a new report from the World Trade Organization, but there was a net fall in trade-restrictive measures.

The figure represents an increase on the 76 anti-dumping investigations initiated between November 15, 2012, and May 15, 2013.

The increase in initiations in the second period is due to increased anti-dumping activity in Australia, Brazil, South Korea and the United States, the WTO's Report on G-20 Trade Measures says. These increases have more than offset a decline in initiations by Argentina and India who – after tying for the most active member in the previous period with 15 new investigations apiece – in total launched just 13 investigations in the latest period.

The WTO pointed out that since the first monitoring report was circulated in September 2009, the number of anti-dumping investigations initiated by G-20 members declined through mid-2011. Anti-dumping activities rebounded in the second half of 2011, and peaked in 2013, with 238 new investigations initiated by G-20 states. It is "not unlikely" that initiations launched by end-2014 will reach a similar number, the report said.

The report also revealed that G-20 member states initiated 12 countervailing duty investigations in the second period, down from 17 in the first period. Only five G-20 members – Australia, Brazil, Canada, the European Union and the United States – were active, with the European Union significantly increasing the number of initiations, from one in the first period to five in the second. Brazil and Canada initiated no new investigations in the second period, compared with a combined total of six in the first period.

In general there has been a slight decline in new trade restrictions implemented by G-20 members. In the period between mid-November 2013 and mid-May 2014 a total of 112 new trade-restrictive measures were put in place by G-20 nations. The figure for the period between mid-May and mid-November 2013 was 116.

The report also noted that trade liberalizing measures have increased. In the most recent period of review, the number of such measures taken by G-20 members was 93, compared with 57 in the period mid-May to mid-November 2013. The liberalizing measures now represent a larger share of all recorded measures (45 percent) than in the previous period (33 percent).

Source: Tax News