G7 Nations To Get Tougher On China

After a meeting in Germany on September 15, representatives from G7 countries— Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States — issued a joint statement pledging to take coordinated action to confront other countries on issues related to intellectual property theft, industrial subsidies, and lowered environmental and labor standards.

Specifically, the countries called out “unfair practices, such as all forms of forced technology transfer, intellectual property theft, lowering of labor and environmental standards to gain competitive advantage, market-distorting actions of state-owned enterprises, and harmful industrial subsidies, including those that lead to excess capacity.”

The joint statement, available here, also laid out areas for coordination on a range of other global issues, including Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, reform and modernization of the World Trade Organization, and supply chain resiliency.

While the formal statement did not mention China’s unfair trade practices explicitly, government leaders did.

Speaking for Germany and the other countries assembled, Minister for Economic Affairs and Climate Protection Robert Habeck pledged that Germany would urge the European Union to create a new trade policy on China, and that other G7 countries would make similar efforts. Habeck also vowed, “The time when one said ‘Trade, no matter what,’ regardless of the social or humanitarian standards, … is something we shouldn’t allow ourselves anymore.”

The announcement came the same day that U.S. President Joe Biden signed an executive order stepping up efforts to block Chinese investment in U.S. technology. Read more about that measure here.

The announcement also came after The Wall Street Journal editorial board reported on China’s lackluster record on the environment. The Journal noted that, as of July 2022, China had some 258 coal-fired power stations proposed, permitted, or under construction that, if completed, would generate some 290 gigawatts, or more than 60 percent of the world’s total coal capacity under development and about one-fourth of total existing U.S. power generating capacity.