China stop claiming special WTO benefits that have stored us

Prime Minister Li Qiang announced on Tuesday in New York that the country would stop seeking new “special and differential” rights in all the current and future negotiations of the WTO, according to the Xinhua news agency managed by the State and a WTO declaration at the head of the WTO on X. Li is currently in the United States to attend the United Nations General Assembly.

The director general of the WTO, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, praised the decision on X, the appellant “the culmination of many years of hard work” and thanking the management of China.

The gesture is important at a time when the higher American prices force China to divert more and more from its exports to the increase in economic powers from Latin America to Africa and South-East Asia, a push that begins to respond to resistance in the world.

And as Beijing seeks to negotiate a more sustainable trade agreement with the United States, it is also an effort to create the favor of President Donald Trump, who has long since bristled the designation which, according to him, was unjustly applied to the second world economy.

The question of China’s status was also one of the questions that maintain negotiations on the WTO reform.

Earlier this year, the heads of commerce from the whole Asia-Pacific region, including the United States and China, recognized the importance of the organization to advance commercial issues and the need for its rules while calling for a “significant, necessary and complete reform to improve all its functions”.

The status of development of the nation is self-declared and offers various advantages to the members of the WTO, including longer deadlines to implement agreements. China has long called the world’s largest development state, stressing this position to claim a leading role for other emerging countries.

Despite the transformation of the four decades of China which transformed it into the greatest commercial and manufacturing economy in the world, the UN always class as a development nation. It ranks well outside the top 50 of the world by the gross domestic product per capita, according to the International Monetary Fund, below Serbia and just in front of Montenegro and Turkmenistan.

In 2019, the Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi said that China declared a nation “developed” in international affairs represented a form of inequality. And earlier this year, he described his country as a “natural member” of the world South because of a “shared common history of the fight against colonialism and hegemony and a common mission of development and revitalization”.

Although no longer eligible for special treatment, the status of China as a development nation will not change, Han Yong, head of the Ministry of Commerce, on Wednesday in Beijing.

Wendy Cutler, main vice-president of the Asia Society Policy Institute and veteran American commercial negotiator, said the announcement was “years too late”.

“In the light of the absence of an WTO negotiation program and the slowness of its reform efforts, the announcement – while welcome – will have little practical effect,” said Cutler. But he “will help Beijing to make the case of his lasting commitment to the multilateral trading system, in contrast strongly with Washington which maintains his contributions to the organization”.

Beijing has positioned itself as a champion of developing countries and described the decision as an extension of this effort. China has sought to counter the World Order led by the United States in part by courting the world South.

China’s decision not to claim the advantages “is an important measure to protect and strengthen the multilateral trade system” and highlight “the role of China as a major developing country,” the Ministry of Commerce said in a statement.

It is also “an important action to implement the global development initiative and the global governance initiative,” he said, referring to two Policy Proposals in China in recent years to reform global affairs. LI’s announcement came to the event of the Global Development Initiative, according to Xinhua.

The United States has criticized China, which continues to claim development status. Trump declared in 2019 in his first mandate in 2019 that “the United States has never accepted China’s claim to develop the status of countries, and almost all current economic indicators denies the claim of China”.

The US trade representative and the White House did not immediately respond to a request for more information on the announcement.

The question of the status of China extends beyond global trade, because it is also a big point of collation for climate negotiations.

Developed states are supposed to contribute to a fund of $ 100 billion per year to help emerging nations to pay for climatic fixes. But although China is now the largest issuer in the world, its designation means that it does not pay the fund – a position criticized by Europe and the United States

Despite the change announced by China, it is unlikely to defuse a multitude of tensions between Beijing and Washington on trade and other questions. Chinese exports are still increasing sharply, increasing by almost 6% in the first eight months of this year to reach a record for this period.

The chief representative of Chinese trade, Li Chenggang, attacked American policies on Wednesday a few hours after the WTO announcement with a warning that “hegemony, unilateralism and protectionism are crawling”.

“Currently, the multilateral trade system based on rules is faced with serious challenges,” said Li, who is also vice-commerce, journalists in Beijing. “A certain country launched a trade war and then a tariff war, seriously damaging the legitimate interests of the WTO members and seriously disturbing the world commercial order, and bringing uncertainties and instability to the world economy.”