US promises to help China implement WTO commitments

The US has pledged to work with China in helping it implement difficult World Trade Organisation (WTO) commitments on opening up its economy to foreign competition.

The US Trade Representative, Mr Robert Zoellick, made the pledge during a three-day visit to China yesterday in which he called on Beijing to play a role in persuading other trading partners to open markets to agricultural products and manufactured goods and services under a new round of WTO trade talks agreed in Doha, Qatar.

Mr Zoellick made no mention of the simmering row over steel tariffs which the US has placed on products from China, the European Union and other steel producers.

"Our goal now should be to work together to ensure that China's commitments are implemented faithfully and on schedule, and to ensure that China, in turn, can utilise WTO rules to prevent other countries from closing their markets unfairly to Chinese goods," he said in an address to the Central University of Finance and Economics in Beijing.

Mr Zoellick acknowledged that the implementation of China's commitments would not be easy.

"When problems arise, as they will, my preferred method will be to consult, to try to understand the Chinese perspective, and to make suggestions on how to proceed in securing implementation of China's commitments," he said.

China joined the WTO in December after a 15-year wait. It has started the gradual opening of its markets to foreign competition across all sectors including telecommunications, computer services, banking, securities, insurance and distribution.

Mr Zoellick warned China that it needed to work to improve protection and enforcement of intellectual property rights. But he said the rewards of WTO membership would bring China lower prices, greater consumer choice, greater enterprise efficiency, enhanced productivity, higher wages and new jobs. In the speech, he did not touch on the row over US steel tariffs, which Washington imposed on March 20th to help the ailing US steel industry.

China, which exported more than $300 million (€342 million) in steel to the US last year, filed its first formal complaint to the WTO since becoming a member of the organisation after Washington imposed the tariffs.