European solar manufacturers welcome European Parliament debate on Chinese dumping

UK: During the plenary debate on 22 November, Members of the European Parliament made it very clear that they expect the European Commission to speed up its investigation against Chinese dumping of photovoltaic products.

The Commission initiated an antidumping investigation on solar imports from China in September, followed by initiation of an anti-subsidy investigation in November. The investigations will include analysis of
industry and market data and inspections of European and Chinese companies by European Commission officials.

The European Commission has a maximum of nine months to deal with each of the investigations, which means the anti-dumping investigation has to be concluded latest in early June, and the anti-subsidy investigation in early August 2013. Given the number of insolvencies in the European solar industry that already took place in 2012, the majority of MEPs participating in the debate strongly urged the European Commission to take action before the nine-month deadline in order to save European jobs and industry.

EU ProSun, which represents the majority of European solar pruduction filed both trade complaints with the European Commission. Milan Nitzschke, president and spokesperson of EU ProSun said: "EU ProSun applauds the call of Members of the European Parliament on the European Commission for an accelerated decision. Chinese manufacturers continue to undercut each other with heavily dumped prices and thereby destroy jobs and technologies in Europe.

"As Chinese companies expect that the European Union will take action to tackle this problem, they started dismantling their warehouses in China to ship even more solar power products over to the European Union. This is obviously a step to pre-empt and avoid the upcoming anti-dumping and anti-subsidy tariffs. The rapid emptying of warehouses leads to further distortions in the European solar market. The European Commission must not waste time and has to intervene before it is too late."