The European Union's trade chief decided to launch a probe into whether Chinese shoes are being dumped on the EU market after workers demonstrated in Brussels today.
"Peter Mandelson has decided to recommend to the Commission the launching of an investigation on anti-dumping for (Chinese) shoes," said Commission spokeswoman Claude Veron-Reville. If approved by the full EU executive, the probe would open at the end of this month, she added.
The EU would impose additional duties on Beijing's shoe exports if the probe finds that they are being sold at below-production cost prices in the bloc. Representatives of Europe's footwear industry met Mr Mandelson earlier today and urged the EU to impose emergency anti-dumping duties on Chinese shoe imports, which have leapt by close to 700 per cent since the start of this year.
"The Commission must adopt defence measures. We have asked for an anti-dumping procedure," said European Confederation of the Footwear Industry Chairman Raphael Calvo.
Approximately 400 people demonstrated to press for action to brake the surge of cheap shoe imports from China, unleashed after quotas were lifted at the end of last year.
The EU's executive said last week there had been a year-on-year rise of 681 per cent in imports of six categories of Chinese footwear in the first four months of this year, with shipments of some shoes jumping by well over 1,000 percent.
Prices dropped by 28 per cent over the same period.