Though the EU and US need for imports from China can be seen most clearly in machinery and electronic equipment, some degree of dependence exists across a range of industries, the non-profit think tank Mercator Institute for China Studies (Merics) said in an analysis released on Wednesday.
Textiles and furniture were deemed areas of “significant reliance” by authors of the report, which crunched numbers from as far back as 2000.
Over the past year, the EU has stepped up anti-subsidy probes and raised tariffs on Chinese imports, mostly covering goods related to the lucrative EV industry.
The US relied “heavily” on imports from China in 532 of about 5,000 categories in 2022, the think tank said, nearly four times the figure recorded in 2000. The EU’s count for the same year was 421, about three times more than in 2004.
