Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said in a Nov. 28 interview that he remains determined to support industries hit by the epidemic and Australian wine producers who have been heavily bonded by China, and plans to reach new trade agreements with the United Kingdom and the European Union. Australia’s Trade Minister, Simon Birmingham, also confirmed in an interview on September 29 that Australia is actively considering taking China to the World Trade Organization (WTO) over barley tariffs.
Morrison told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) on Saturday that “as a government we will be looking at how we can get some of our producers through this difficult period.” He said, “We’ve done that in the New Canopy outbreak and people will know that. The airlines have basically shut down (in the epidemic) and the planes are no longer (carrying) things like crayfish.” Friction between China and Australia has continued since Australia proposed an investigation into the origins of the neo-crown virus. China’s Ministry of Commerce announced Friday a preliminary ruling on an anti-dumping investigation into Australian wine, saying, “There was dumping of wine originating in Australia, substantial injury to China’s domestic wine industry, and there was a causal relationship between dumping and substantial injury. The announcement announced that from November 28th, tariffs of between 107% and 212.1% will be imposed on Australian wine imports in the form of a bond.
Birmingham later responded that the new tariffs proposed by China would be “devastating” to the Australian wine industry. It is completely inconsistent with China’s commitments through the Australia-China Free Trade Agreement and through the World Trade Organization,” he said. It’s incompatible with a rules-based trading system. He stressed, “It would make wine trade with China unviable for many companies. Obviously we don’t think that’s reasonable and there’s no evidence to support that.” In Sunday’s interview, Birmingham further revealed that the Australian government is in “active discussions” with the food industry about whether to take China to the WTO over the trade dispute.
Frankly, there are different views on the issue,” Birmingham said. But in general, Australia is committed to a rules-based international trading system. He added, “If we insist on pushing for a rules-based system, you should use that rules-based system, including speaking up when you think the rules are being broken, and letting international judges help resolve those disputes.” He continued, “We use the WTO to point out their problems, and we still use all these procedures in the Chinese system to try to resolve them. But at the end of the day, these are China’s decisions, and China chooses to apply them to Australia, and only China can choose to overturn those decisions.”
Birmingham said Australia would look at how China’s anti-dumping investigation was proceeding before taking the wine dispute to the WTO for arbitration. When he was asked by the moderator if China’s series of actions against Australia were economic coercion, Birmingham replied, “I think people around the world are asking that question.” He said it was up to the Chinese authorities to explain that Australia had “not changed” its support for free trade, consistent with international norms to which both Australia and China are committed. He spoke of “the fact that we have seen, however, that China has become more assertive in other ways as well, with its welcome economic rise.”
Birmingham said, “What we’d like to see is that confidence channeled for good, channeled into ways of engaging with the rest of the world that will help drive economic growth, not inhibit it.” In the interview, Birmingham also dismissed the suggestion that Australia’s rhetoric and actions in calling for an investigation into the source of the virus and upgrading the military agreement with Japan were “over the top. He stressed that the recent defense agreement between Australia and Japan was the result of years of negotiations and had nothing to do with China.
In an interview on Sunday morning, Morrison acknowledged that the relationship between Australia and China is fraught with tensions at the moment. He said, “It’s a difficult time, there are tensions, and …… Australia is no stranger to tensions”. He cited Australia’s problems with the European single market in the 1970s as an example of the challenges Australia has endured. Morrison says, “All of these economic things have impacted the system, and what’s quite amazing about Australia, particularly those who work in our agricultural sector, is their ability to adapt to weather and climate change. But at the same time, they’ve had to deal with those things in the past.”
Morrison continued, “You can’t control everything in the world, but the one thing you can control is who you are, your values, and what you know is important, and staying steadfast.” He said, “We’re going to do everything we can to make sure that we’re able to work through these trade issues that come up with China.” Morrison also said he is focusing his efforts on signing new trade agreements with the European Union and the United Kingdom.
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