F REIGN TRADE - 中国国际贸易促进委员会

ministration proposed National
Export Initiative (NEI), placing
expanding export as one priority of
its work. On the contrary, China,
in order to deal with the huge trade
surplus, began to list increasing
import in its 12th five year plan. In
this view, Sino-US economic and
trade cooperation had a foundation
of mutual demand. Theoretically, it
is true. But what would be the concrete
integration point in reality?
What are the major barriers?
Dr. Tu: Yes, it is true theoretically.
But there are indeed some paradoxes. First, the US government
proposed the NEI and set the goal of its export, but
it didn’t issue the concrete implementing steps or measures.
This made me doubt the effect of NEI. I met an American
expert in this field a few days ago, and when we talked about
this issue, he expressed the same questioning.
You know, there are two aspects to do in order to increase
the export. One is to strengthen one’s own industrial
competitiveness and the other is to open export market,
which demands trade liberalization. The US government
mentioned improving its strength and capturing the height of
emerging industries. In opening the export market, the US
needs trade liberalization, not only bilaterally but more multilaterally.
However, the US government has been keeping a
negative attitude over the Doha negotiation. And the TPP
still did not have clear goals and progress. So I really question
its NEI.
The second problem is that what the US will sell to China.
You know, by now, Miscellaneous products( category 99),
according to the export and import goods classification, are
still the category with the largest amount that the US sold
to China. All kinds of scraps accounted for a large portion of
FOR THE US SIDE, THEY
ALSO SHOULD SEE THE
SOURCE OF CHINA’S TRADE
SURPLUS. IT IS NOT THE
PROBLEM BETWEEN CHINA
AND THE US. THE ROOT
ACTUALLY LIES IN THE
RELATIONS BETWEEN THE
CAPITAL AND THE LABOR.
this category. Besides the Miscellaneous
products, mechanical equipment, particularly
the electric equipment, and the
agricultural products are what the US
mainly sold to China. So the question is
what else the US could export to China?
For its export control, many products the
US bears the comparative advantage over
China could not be exported to China.
Then what else? For the traditional manufactured
products, the US does not have
the comparative advantage obviously. So
the US companies moved to China and
manufactured goods, which then was
exported back to the US. Even the high-tech ipods are also
not produced in the US, but in China. So how does the US
increase its export to China?
CFT: So just as you mentioned, the ipods are produced
in China and then back to the US. Actually a large portion
of China’s trade surplus were produced in this way, and the
surplus creators are those large MNCs, including quite a few
US MNCs. However, the US government always pressed
China in trade issues taking China’s huge trade surplus with
the US as the so-called “evidence”. So how do you comment
on China’s trade surplus with the US?
Dr. Tu: You are right. China just bore a bad name of
having huge trade surplus, but actually share a very small
portion of benefit. Take the ipod as an example. Chinese
companies only earn 5% of the added-value. There are
complaints over this in China. I think there is nothing to
complain. You still don’t have the capacity to take the 95%
added-value, that’s your problem. And those MNCs chose
to locate their production here for they thought the investment
environment was good for them to invest. However,
for the US side, they also should see the source of China’s
trade surplus. It is not the problem between China
and the US. The root actually lies in the relations
between the capital and the labor. Capital’s nature
of going after profit means that it would move to
the place it can maximize the profitability. For the
low labor cost and other factors, the US MNCs
moved its production from its home to China.
This kind of industrial transfer caused the unemployment
in its home country, or the labor had
to shift to the third industries. You know, in the
US, the income of the employees in the average
third industries is comparatively lower than in the
second industries. So in either situation, the sense
of happiness would be reduced in general. They
thought it was Chinese who scrambled their jobs.
So China’s huge surplus became one target for
them to lodge their complaint. Actually, to solve
this problem, China has nothing to help. Even
though China’s huge surplus is reduced a lot, it
does not necessarily mitigate the US’s unemployment.
Their problems can only be addressed by
themselves.
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