Europeans, Americans wary of China economy

BRUSSELS—Nearly 60 percent of Europeans and Americans see China's growing economic power as a threat although they are becoming more positive about globalization in general, an opinion poll showed on Monday.
The survey, by the German Marshall Fund, a transatlantic think tank, comes as policymakers in Brussels and Washington are planning to update trade and investment ties with China, wary of its new economic might but keen for more of its huge market.
Fifty-nine percent of Americans and Europeans see China's economy as a threat due to its low-cost imports and companies relocating to China, according to the poll which covered France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Slovakia, Britain and the United States. Only a third of respondents on both sides of the Atlantic considered China to be an opportunity.
Of the six European countries covered, 70 percent of people in France and only slightly fewer in Poland, Italy and Slovakia expressed fears over China's emerging economy.
Traditionally free-trading Britain alone had more people who saw China as an opportunity than a threat, the survey found.
With European manufacturing coming under pressure from Asia, the European Commission has imposed anti-dumping duties on a range of Chinese exports, including leather shoes, saying they broke international trade rules. European trade chief Peter Mandelson last month said Beijing must show Europe that free trade is a two-way street by lowering barriers to its big markets for foreign exporters and investors.
EU and Chinese negotiators are due to begin talks next month on a broad new bilateral agreement, including economic issues. US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson is leading a high-level Washington delegation to China later this month.
In potentially good news for attempts to break a deadlock in world trade talks, the poll showed 52 percent of respondents favored globalization in general, up from 46 percent in 2005.
Possibly behind that was a fall in dissatisfaction about the local economy -- 41 percent of Americans and 27 percent of Europeans were satisfied with the economy, up from 30 and 20 percent respectively in 2005, the survey found.
The World Trade Organization's (WTO) Doha round of talks to boost trade around the planet has been suspended since July and could be delayed by several years without a deal in early 2007.
The poll showed France, the most ardent defender of the EU's farm protections in the WTO talks, was the most wary about globalization with 47 percent supporting it, albeit an increase from 43 percent in 2005.
But in a sign of how sensitive an issue free trade remains, two thirds of the French and over half the American respondents in the poll favored keeping trade barriers when local companies are at risk, even if it means slower economic growth.
The poll heard the views of about 1,000 people in each of the seven countries between September 5 and 25.

—The Daily Mail-China Daily news exchange item