Most EC Trade Probes Involve Japan, China : Commerce: The two countries accounted for almost half the ‘dumping’ investigations the European Community initiated in 1991.

Almost half the investigations begun last year into alleged dumping of products on the European Community market have involved Japan and China, the EC Commission says.

Five of 20 investigations concerned Japanese products and four Chinese goods, the executive arm of the 12-nation bloc said in an annual report on dumping.

Taiwan was involved in two investigations while South Korea, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, the former Soviet Union, Egypt, Hungary, Poland and Turkey were each the target of one.

Since 1987 Japan, China and South Korea have topped the league of countries accused of unfairly undercutting EC rivals by offering prices below production cost or below the price charged in the manufacturer’s home country.

The EC executive said that in 1991 the commission imposed 38 duties and accepted three price adjustments, about the same as the year before.

But the focus of dumping investigations swung from chemicals and textiles to electronics and iron and steel.

Over the year, the EC Commission investigated products as diverse as Norwegian salmon, fax paper from Japan, Japanese computer chips, Japanese and South Korean audio cassettes and Turkish polyester fibers and yarns.

For the first time, EC industries complained in 1991 that exporters were absorbing dumping duties.

The EC Commission is still investigating complaints that exporters of Japanese and South Korean compact disc players and polyolefin woven bags and silicon metal from China are simply absorbing the duties, perpetuating the dumping.