Australia takes wine dispute with China to World Trade Organization

Name: Trade ‘only one part of the battle‘ in China-Australia dispute, says legal expert Bryan Mercurio
Uploaded: 2021-06-19T03:53:44.000Z
Duration: 9 min 20 s
Description: Trade ‘only one part of the battle‘ in China-Australia dispute, says legal expert Bryan Mercurio

Australian winemakers shipped just US$9 million of wines to China in the four months from December to March, down from US$244 million a year earlier

Beijing’s tariffs have doubled or tripled the price of Australian wine and made the Chinese market unviable for exporters, Canberra said earlier

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A display of Australian wines is seen at the China International Import Expo in Shanghai in November. Photo: AP

Reutersin Melbourne

Published: 11:53am, 19 Jun 2021Updated: 11:55am, 19 Jun 2021

The Australian government said on Saturday it was lodging a formal complaint with the World Trade Organization over China’s imposition of anti-dumping duties on Australian wine exports, escalating further the trade stand-off with Beijing.

“The government will continue to vigorously defend the interests of Australian winemakers using the established system in the WTO to resolve our differences,” Dan Tehan, minister for trade, tourism and investment, said in a joint press release with Agriculture Minister David Littleproud.

Relations with China, already rocky after Australia banned Huawei Technologies Co. from its nascent 5G broadband networking in 2018, have worsened since Canberra called for an international inquiry into the origins of the coronavirus, first reported in central China last year.

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Trade ‘only one part of the battle‘ in China-Australia dispute, says legal expert Bryan Mercurio

China, Australia’s largest trading partner, responded by imposing tariffs on Australian commodities, including wine and barley and limited imports of Australian beef, coal and grapes, moves described by the United States as “economic coercion”.

Last year, Australia launched a formal appeal to the WTO seeking a review of China’s decision to impose hefty tariffs on imports of Australian barley.

The wine tariffs doubled or tripled its price and made the Chinese market unviable for exporters, the Australian government had said earlier.

Australian winemakers shipped just A$12 million (US$9 million) of wines to China in the four months from December to March, from A$325 million a year earlier, industry figures showed, confirming that hefty new tariffs have all but wiped out their biggest export market.