Safeguarding the interests of Chinese industry in Europe

Trade war tremors
Bridging the differences

Raising all the important questions
The message was engineered to achieve an enhanced political communications channel between the EU institutional framework and Chinese industry and government, demonstrating the possible trade war consequences the EU was facing. It showed that there was a lapse in communication between the European economic mindset and that of economic entities with decades of experience in China. It demonstrated the relatively limited and only slightly increasing market share of the dumped imports from mainland China. It put forward that the dumping was a natural consequence of China’s macro-economic situation and production pressures. It showed that other market factors had contributed to the EU economic injury. It put forward that the Commission had not shown a causal link between the detriments suffered by the EU market and dumped imports from mainland China. Moreover, it cast doubt on the way the Commission had defined the market of PVA in light of the broader range of uses of the PVA. Most importantly, it encouraged a better culture of empathy between the Commission and the East Asian economic climate.
Making local arguments part Of EU economic policy
Our strategy has laid a concrete groundwork for the long term reconciliation of the European Commission’s economic policy, and good faith public and private activity coming from the Chinese market. It was a multi-faced approach that combined law, economics and science into a technical adversarial context. In this regard, we deployed the signature cross-disciplinary advocacy that makes our firm unique. It showed that the trade dynamics were wider than those considered by the Commission’s narrow albeit costly investigation. It framed a fundamentally different methodological approach that considered these dynamics. Communications were dispatched at the right times on the business calendar to reshape the Commission’s mindset at appropriate phases. It substantiated that the market for PVA had not been properly demarcated. At the same time, it brought to the Commission’s attention the reality that Chinese producers had little or no excess capacity and focused on their huge fast growing domestic market, on elsewhere in Asia as well as on Europe where demand far outstrips production. The nature of the Chinese domestic market put downward price pressure on the PVA. This was a key reason for the price difference that the euro-centric approach of the Commission did not account for.
Paving the way for Chinese industry representation in Europe
The impact of our efforts was to help the European Commission build a better working relationship with the Chinese business community and with multi-national firms working in China. We also raised awareness of the costs, market pressures and challenges facing them and how these change in diverse domestic and foreign markets. It was the start of our ongoing initiative to create a paradigm shift in the European Commission’s approach that will benefit our Chinese clients. We will continue to guide this shift for a broad range of transcontinental industries based in China, to fulfill the ongoing necessity of keeping communication levels up to par with economic progress.
Revision of the decision
Alber & Geiger’s lobbying activity lead to the Commission revising its preliminary tariff decision. We were able to successfully get the Commission to completely understand Solutia’s position and the Chinese situation in general. This success was achieved despite the heavy political animosity from the US and the EU against the PVA export industry in China. We were able to steer the Commission into making a complete U-turn from its entrenched position. This success was due to the years spent developing the cross-disciplinary adversarial mechanics of our firm. It is the result of the unique knowledge and skills infrastructure. That includes everything from the composition of the staff, the type of clients we have taken on and the knowledge accrued from our high profile mandates. This infrastructure is being increasingly orientated towards the multi-jurisdictional trade dynamics between the EU and China.