By Kirby Chien
BEIJING (Reuters) - China will face more WTO complaints and anti-dumping accusations as the global recession forces U.S. and European firms to seek relief from intense competition, a European business group said on Tuesday.
China's massive industrial overcapacity, low labour costs and efficient manufacturing support its cheap exports on world markets, threatening profit margins, jobs, and the very existence of some sectors in Europe and the United States.
"I am unfortunately a little more pessimistic because I see so much trade friction going on," Joerg Wuttke, the president of the European Union Chamber of Commerce in China, told reporters.
"Given that economic growth will remain slow in the United States and Europe, there will be more companies speaking up," said Wuttke after a chamber event.
Members of a U.S. trade panel said on Monday that President Barack Obama should impose import duties of up to 55 percent on low-cost Chinese tyres because they are disrupting American markets.
That recommendation came after the U.S. opened its third anti-dumping investigation against Chinese steel imports in 10 days, a move that Beijing said was a shocking sign of trade protectionism.
The root cause of the rising tension is China's exports, which have exploded in the past decade, reaching $1.43 trillion (856 billion pounds) in 2008 from $195 billion in 1999.
"I see more anti-dumping cases on the horizon," said Wuttke. "I see more WTO settlement cases coming up."
Wuttke said that while China had avoided outright protectionist measures -- unlike clear anti-trade steps taken by Indonesia, India and Russia -- there were still many instances of unfair practices that eroded the spirit of fair competition.
More than 54 percent of EU chamber members polled said Beijing "strongly" enforced environmental regulations on foreign firms, but only 7 percent said domestic firms faced the same level of scrutiny.
"The uneven enforcement of environmental laws is like a hidden subsidy for domestic competitors," said Wuttke.
The percentage of chamber members who felt China was implementing changes in the spirit of the World Trade Organisation fell to 22 percent this year from 32 percent in 2008. While 56 percent thought China was not acting in the spirit of the WTO.
"This is, of course, not good news," he said.
China has been the biggest target of anti-dumping probes over the last 14 years. In 2008, China was the subject of more than one-third of the 208 anti-dumping investigations worldwide.
($=6.83 yuan)
(Reporting by Kirby Chien; Editing by Alex Richardson)
