The most obvious symbol is that of Chinese electric cars, whose European imports have gone from zero to 12 billion euros in five years, with brands like BYD and MG suddenly discovered by the general public. There are also European imports of organic chemicals (+ 34% in five years) or those of plastics, which have almost doubled. Or even medicines: half of the laboratories in the world that produce amoxicillin, the most commonly used antibiotic, are located in China.
While the Chinese economy is in a sharp slowdown, its factories, often heavily subsidized, are overflowing. Its products are sold for export, at often unbeatable prices, with ever more advanced technologies: solar panels, batteries, electric vehicles, biotechnologies, etc.
Despite calls to “European sovereignty” and to a “European industrial policy”, there is currently no economic decoupling between the European Union (EU) and China. Between 2013 and 2023, the EU’s trade deficit with China almost tripled, to 291 billion euros in 2023. France has a trade deficit of 41 billion euros. But Germany has also had a structural trade deficit for thirty-five years, which widened significantly during the Covid-19 pandemic, before stabilizing at 59 billion euros in 2023.
“We see a real commercial decoupling between the United States and China, notes Adam Slater, from Oxford Economics. The share of Chinese imports increased from 23% of total imports in 2018 to 14% in 2023. But we do not see the same phenomenon in Europe. » Chinese imports into Europe remain stable, although at a much lower level, around 6% of total imports for France, 7% for Germany, and 12% for the United Kingdom.
Faced with the Chinese trade offensive, the EU has chosen much gentler methods than those of the United States, which increased customs duties starting with the presidency of Donald Trump, before the Biden administration launched a gigantic subsidy plan for industry, the famous Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). Solar panels, washing machines, steel and even aluminum now have customs duties that often exceed 25%.
So far, the EU has sometimes threatened but rarely resorted to the same practice. As a result, for Chinese electric cars, for example, the EU imposes customs duties of 10%, the United States of 27.5%. “European reindustrialization remains an aspiration, believes Mr. Slater. To get there, you have to go hard. No company wants to change its organization and its value chains, and they will only do so if they really have to. » Review of the European industries most at risk.
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