37th annual report on the EU’s anti-dumping, anti-subsidy and safeguard activities and the use of trade defence instruments by third countries targeting the EU in 2018

Summary:

Report presented on 27 March 2019 by the European Commission on the European Union's trade defence activity in 2018.

Further information:

This report gives two accounts of the EU’s trade defence activity. First, and exceptionally going beyond the legal obligations, the report specifically takes stock of the major challenges, developments and achievements of the Juncker Commission in the area of trade defence.

Second, the report describes the EU’s anti-dumping (AD), anti-subsidy (AS) and safeguard activities as well as the trade defence activity of third countries against the EU in 2018. The report is accompanied by a Commission Staff Working Document, together with annexes, providing more detailed information and statistics.

Background:

To be free, trade must be fair. EU trade defence is the cornerstone of the EU's action to preserve fair trade conditions. At the same time, modern trade defence instruments (TDI) ought to be adapted to economic realities and their use limited to what is necessary to remove the effects of injurious and unfairly traded imports. It is in that spirit that the Commission's 2015 Communication ‘Trade for all’ sets out the priority goal of making TDI more effective and efficient.

This was all the more important, as throughout its mandate, the Juncker Commission dealt with a very high number of cases of unfair imports, many of which were critical for the European economy. In the period November 2014 - December 2018, 170 TDI cases were initiated and 95 measures were applied in order to restore a level playing field. Of the latter, 35 are new measures and the remainder are renewals or extensions of existing measures.

Official

EUR-Lex: SWD(2019)141: Commission Staff Working Document accompanying COM(2019)158 https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=SWD:2019:141:FIN

European Commission: Press Release, 28/03/2019: Report on EU trade defence – effective protection against unfair trade http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-19-1850_en.htm

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