'Fight dumping probes earlier'

Chinese steel wire rod producers should have taken active measures to fight an anti-dumping investigation launched by the European Union last year, to prevent the imposition of high anti-dumping levies and beat a slide in exports, government officials and experts said yesterday.

They also suggested that Chinese exporters should appropriately leverage trade tools under the World Trade Organization, instead of ignoring it as they usually do, to choke down rising trade protectionism by some Western nations amid the financial crisis, and to protect their legal rights.

At a meeting of EU foreign ministers held on Monday, the 27-member body approved without discussion a measure to impose a definitive anti-dumping duty of up to 24 percent on steel wire rods imported from China for as long as five years.