Carbon border tax will violate international trade principles
China’s Ministry of Ecology and Environment spokesman Liu Youbin said that the European Union’s plan to impose the world’s first carbon border tax will expand climate issues into trade in violation of international principles and hurt prospects for economic growth, Reuters reported.
Youbin said “CBAM is essentially a unilateral measure to extend the climate change issue to the trade sector. It violates WTO principles and will seriously undermine mutual trust in the global community and the prospects for economic growth.”
He reiterated China’s stance that each country’s response to climate change should take into account its level of economic development and CO2 tariff would severely harm the willingness and capability of countries to tackle the issue.
The European Commission this month outlined plans to impose a Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism or CO2 tariff, on polluting goods from 2026, forcing some companies importing into the European Union to pay carbon costs at the border on carbon-intensive products such as steel.
