Taken in vice between the United States and China in the trade war between the two countries, the chemical industry is afraid of seeing up to 350 sites in the EU, including 47 in France. The concerns focuses mainly on a potential wave of dumping. © Martin Lopez / Pexels – 150,000 to 200,000 jobs could be threatened on the EU scale, including up to 20,000 in France. Safeguard safeguarded Receive trade warnings “We are caught up in the vice”, alerts Frédéric Gauchet, president of the France Chemistry association, which represents 4000 French companies. Faced with trade tensions between the American and Chinese giants, industrialists fear an unprecedented wave of dumping, relays Sud-Ouest. With the customs barriers implemented by Washington and Beijing, the flows of chemicals could brutally redirect to Europe. But with broken prices, even sales at a loss, which may strangle a large part of the European factories. France Chemistry estimates that 150,000 to 200,000 jobs are threatened on the EU level, including up to 20,000 in France. Debt to “higher energy costs in Europe”, “global overcapacity” and “unfavorable taxation”, continues Frédéric Gauchet, European chemistry could have the greatest difficulty. Particularly threatened, so -called “upstream” chemistry, which includes basic products such as nitric acid. “It is possible that there is no longer any production of nitric acid in Europe if we do nothing,” alerts the president of the association. Because China, with its latest generation factories, unbeatable costs and a supply facilitated by the war in Ukraine, floods the market. Read also: Do the Giants of the Pharma are preparing to flee Europe for the United States? The EU applies only 3% customs duties on chemicals, but China is not the only country to practice this unfair competition: the United States and Egypt are also targeted by anti-dumping procedures opened by Brussels, on PVC plastic. In this customs war, according to the association’s calculations, 10 to 20 billion euros in Chinese products and up to 10 billion on the United States on the United States could surge in Europe. As a reminder, the chemical industry covers sectors ranging from parapetrol products to the pharmacy. The European Union only applies 3% customs duties on chemicals. Receive our latest news every day, selecting the main news of the day. (tagstotranslate) Trade war
