Sino-German efforts urged for solar panel dispute

China and Germany should work together to promote negotiations for proper solutions to current dispute over solar panel import duty between China and the European Union, a spokesman with the Ministry of Commerce said Saturday.

China has urged EU to listen to opinions of all parties and carry out the promise of avoiding any new form of protectionism at the G20 Los Cabos summit, and that the EU should not implement any trade protectionist measures against Chinese products, said the spokesman Shen Danyang.

Germany's SolarWorld and other European solar panel makers in July filed an anti-dumping complaint with the European Commission. The European Commission will decide whether or not to investigate within 45 days after that. If an investigation begins, this will be the largest trade dispute involving China in terms of trade volume.

In face of the current global economic woes, the abuse of trade remedy measures does not help solving trade disputes, but only lead to damage to both sides and to the recovery of global economy, Shen said.

Shen stressed that China has always encouraged and supported dialogues and cooperations within the industry to negotiate and solve issues in industrial development and bilateral trade for win-win results.

It has been a global consensus to develop renewable energies, and all countries should enhance collaboration and push forward the global use of solar energy, he said.

The Ministry of Commerce is willing to create conditions and platforms to enhance such cooperation, Shen added.

China's solar products exports to the European Union came to a total value of 20.4 billion U.S. dollars in 2011. The Ministry of Commerce earlier called the dumping allegations groundless, saying protectionist measures will harm the European solar industry.