Senior officials from Saudi Arabia and China on Sunday failed to resolve Chinese dumping charges on certain Saudi petrochemicals, although they played down the impact of the dispute.
Finance Minister Ibrahim al-Assaf said talks with visiting Chinese Commerce Minister Chen Deming went well but the two sides could not resolve the issue of China's anti-dumping penalties on imports of 1,4-butanediol from Saudi Arabia.
"We continued to discuss this today. We believe we can resolve this problem," Assaf said in a press conference with Chen.
On December 24, China announced anti-dumping tariffs of up to 13.6 percent on Saudi- and Taiwan-produced 1,4-butanediol, a chemical used to make some plastics, elastic fibre and polyurethanes.
The decision followed investigation which showed that the exporters were dumping it at too-low prices and hurting Chinese producers.
After the penalty was announced, the Saudi International Petrochemical Co said that China had levied a 4.5 percent anti-dumping tax on imports of its butanediol.
Chen and Assaf, meanwhile, said they have targeted a 50-percent growth in bilateral trade between 2009 and 2015, increasing the total annual value from 40 billion dollars last year to 60 billion dollars.
Bilateral trade is heavily weighted in Saudi Arabia's favour, with China importing mainly crude oil and petrochemical products.
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