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China-EU relations
ChinaDiplomacy

Exclusive | ‘Very sensitive situation’: is China flooding Europe with ‘overcapacity’ of new energy goods?

  • A former Belgian envoy to the EU says China is not intentionally manufacturing overcapacity to undercut Western competitors
  • Jean de Ruyt says trade divisions are exacerbated by looming EU and US elections and a protracted war in Ukraine

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Senior career diplomat Jean de Ruyt says China is not deliberately attempting to flood Western markets with cheap goods. Photo: Elson Li
Kawala Xie
China’s manufacturing overcapacity is not intentional, according to a former Belgian envoy to the European Union, but Beijing’s disputes with the bloc are difficult to set aside as the war in Ukraine continues in a year that will see elections in both the EU and the United States.
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In an interview with the South China Morning Post, long-time diplomat Jean de Ruyt said the EU must stay engaged with China despite their divisions over trade and the Ukraine war.

Tensions in EU-China relations have escalated as the bloc has accelerated its “de-risking” agenda to address long-standing trade imbalances with Beijing. The EU has also launched probes into China’s new energy goods including electric vehicles, solar panels and wind turbines, which it said have flooded the European market with cheap products that harm local interests.

But de Ruyt, who is co-chair of the Brussels-based Europe-Asia Centre, said China’s “overcapacity” issue is not a deliberate attempt to undercut Western competitors.

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Why the EU, US are concerned about China’s overcapacity

Why the EU, US are concerned about China’s overcapacity

“The reason there is overproduction … is not because the Chinese want to annoy Europeans, it is because of the reduction of consumption locally, because of the pandemic,” de Ruyt, who is also a former ambassador to the United Nations and Nato, told the Post on the sidelines of the Global Prosperity Summit in Hong Kong on Tuesday.

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“But the result is there. If you go to Belgium, to the ports of the North Sea, you have a huge parking lot where we’ve seen thousands and thousands of Chinese electric cars … so it is a problem … and the European Commission had to react to that.”

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