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Good evening to everyone in the room and good evening to everyone who is following us from Brussels.

Welcome to this press conference with EU Commissioner for Trade and Economic Security,

Maroš Šefčovič, who is concluding his negotiations here in Beijing.

He will outline the main outcomes and then take a few questions.

This is accompanied by the joint press statement from Commissioner Šefčovič and Minister Van Wen Tao that is being published as we speak.

Now I give the floor to the Commissioner. Good evening.

As a I wrap up my visit to Beijing.

Let me begin by thanking my counterpart,

Minister Wang Wentao for his time, engagement, and, hospitality.

I also appreciate the opportunity to meet Vice Premier Helifeng.

I came here with one clear purpose to start rebalancing the EU China trade relationship and to make sure this first phase of negotiations under the trade and investment consultations delivers its first tangible outcomes. You know the context.

The trade deficit is a mountain of challenge for the European Union. Felt in every Member State.

And it is unsustainable and it demands a credible path to rebalancing.

We must defend our industries and restore the level playing field that has been distorted by global overcapacity.

Over the last 3 months, we have worked intensely at every level.

We focused on clear priorities and measurable results as a proof of concept.

This is what that engagement has delivered so far.

First, we have reached a shared understanding to moderate China's export of hybrids and plugging hybrids to the European Union.

This open the prospect of cutting China's export by more than 50%.

Second, we have reached a shared understanding to improve access to the Chinese market for a series of EU products through the lower most favoured nations' MFN tariffs.

These range from car parts to olive oil and foodwear totaling almost €4 billion in current export value.

We should bring at least EUR 225 million in duty savings.

For comparison, it is equivalent to up to a quarter of savings of some of our ambitious FTAs,

for example, with Japan or Australia.

Third,

we have reached a shared understanding to further facilitate China's export licencing for rare earth and permanent magnets.

I often say that genuine negotiations deserves a real try. Therefore, I appreciate my counterparts' engagement.

Having said that, this is far from the end.

It's a crucial first step, but only a first step in the process of rebalancing.

As President von der Leyen has said, dialogue needs results, and where the dialogue cannot deliver,

the EU will use its tools to ensure a rebalancing.

Naturally, the President will now assess the outcomes and discuss next steps with the leaders at the upcoming European Council in Brussels. That is where the final decision lies.

With Minister Wang Wentao,

we will reconvene at our level by January and organise the 3rd trade and investment consultations in March to continue the work.

In parallel, our work also goes on in Brussels.

Thank you very much, Commissioner, now it is time for your questions.

If you could kindly introduce yourself, we'll begin with Reuters.

Excuse me, I need to, do we have a microphone for the gentlemen? Thank you. Good evening, Joe Walsh from Reuters.

Are you able to give us more details on the hybrid deal and a simple follow-up question, will it be enough on the autos front? Thank you. Thank you very much for your question.

I would, underline a couple of very important elements.

The first one is that it is, for the first time that China has accepted,

to moderate, its export without going through the phase of prior.

Trade tension and I very much appreciate that.

You already probably have seen that there was a positive reaction of the car industry in Europe,

and from the statement I clearly see that the agreement we have reached goes beyond the expectation.

So I believe that this deal would be appreciated by Of course, the car industry, as I said, it will be presented to my president, to the leaders who would have a detailed look at all the parameters at the European Council next week,

and of course we have all the numbers, but you would understand that first we have to present it to our member states,

to the leaders, and then of course we'll share it with Olof you.

What I would underline though is the fact that We know what is the outcome and we know how we want to get there.

So all this is negotiated in a great,

great detail and therefore I am fully confident that if we get endorsement from the leaders we know how to complete and accomplishment and accomplish the shared understanding. Yes. Hello, madam. Thank you so much for the chance.

This is reporter Yang Yang with CGTN China Global Television Network, and I have two questions.

The first one, how do you assess the overall outcomes of these tariff negotiations between China and the European Commission?

And the 2nd, 2nd 1 is actually the EU has continued to, well,

try to put more restrictions on the imports of Chinese-made electric vehicles to the European markets.

So do you think that would harm the interests of European consumers by limiting their access to a low,

a more competitiveness and of course low price and a high quality products. Thank you so much.

Thank you very much for, for your question.

And first and foremost,

I have to say that we never had the level of intensity of our exchanges and contacts as we have over the last 34 months with our Chinese counterparts.

So, together, Minister Wang Wentao and myself, our chief negotiators, our directors general, Vice Minister Ling Ji,

and the whole team has been working very, very hard to accomplish these results.

So I want to say That this was done in a good faith and this is the result of very intense work and and it reflects also the,

the, the, the appreciation of the situation on the, on the both sides.

You, you know very well that European car industry is under a lot of stress and,

and therefore this step was absolutely crucial, but I think that what we agreed is fair.

We, are, working in a full compliance, with, WTO methodology, which is, appreciated also by our, Chinese, counterparts, and, we know exactly,

how to proceed and, once we get the endorsement by our leaders, we will proceed with all, procedures.

I would like to underscore underscore once again that this is based on a negotiated solution which I would say in this particular turbulent times on the global trading floor is very much appreciated and I believe it's the best solution for both China and the European Union. How about the second one? Sorry. You. Second question, can you repeat it, please? It's too late. Thank you so much for the chance.

Well, the second one is, the European Union has kept imposing restrictions on the Chinese-made electric vehicles.

So will that harm the interests of European consumers by limiting their access to high quality and low-priced products? Thank you so much.

I think if it comes, if you are referring to the Battery electric vehicles.

I think this was again the issue which was discussed and as you know we issued our guidance already in January of this year.

We reconfirmed our policy in that regard also this afternoon and you will find it reflected also in our joint statement and of course in this regards we always have to look for the appropriate balance. What was very important.

For the European Union at this stage is to make sure that the solution which we found would be fair and would also provide adequate remedies and protection.

For the European car industry, and we believe that in the case of battery electric vehicles, in the case of hybrids and plug-in hybrids,

we found a solution and then as I said, we found it after detailed negotiations with our Chinese counterparts.

Hard to see with the lights of Financial Times. Thank you, Le Lay from the Financial Times.

The EU said in June that there needed to be decisive action,

to reduce, Europe's deficit with China by October.

Is this, are these agreements, are these enough, do you think, to forestall any action from the EU now?

I think that what was very clearly stated was that what we need is a tangible outcome from this very intense phase of negotiation.

That was the reason why we established a trade and investment consultation mechanism and we just completed this afternoon. The, the second, session.

I know that, for example, our American partners have, many more rounds than us, so, so we kind of,

went, through this very intense phase, but I believe that we achieved very good results.

But as I said, and I think here we have a clear understanding, with the Minister Wang Guangtao that this is not the end. This is the beginning. I very much appreciate.

The commitment of the minister that we are ready to,

to work together on, balancing the trade between China and, European Union.

In the case of, hybrids and plugging hybrids, we are talking about,

reducing the exports from China to European Union over 4 years by several million cars,

which I think it's pretty significant.

We are talking about, solution, for 7 very concrete, tariff lines, which again I think are offering a variety of solutions for, I would say almost every, single European, European, member states,

and as I said, we also appreciate, that, we are looking for the ways how to smoother further,

the mechanism of, licencing of,

Rare earth and permanent magnet exports for the for the European companies.

So overall this package From my perspective, proves that these negotiations if they are done in such a constructive way as we headed right now,

bring results and show what should be the way forward.

So for us this is kind of blueprint for the next phase. We already agreed on the agenda.

For the next meetings, I will have the video call and contact with Mr.

Van Gendt already in January,

so it would be after we would implement this first shared understanding and we will look further into the future and we want to have another full tick this time.

In Europe, probably already by, by March, and that would be the, the mechanism which we would use and which I believe will,

will help us to proceed gradually with the rebalancing the, the trade between China and the European Union. Lamont Harold Tibou from Lemont newspaper.

Could you tell us how it's gonna work to bring to half the number of,

plug-in hybrids that are sold in Europe if the European consumers want to buy them, how are we going to limit them?

There are different techniques, how can you do these things, and I think that if you look in in just recent couple of months, I, I think you would find the answer,

but you would, I'm sure appreciate that, I first need to discuss the technique, the procedures, and,

and get the endorsement, by the leaders for the steps, in the, in the European Union.

But I, but what I would like to underscore once again, we know exactly what we agreed upon, what we want to achieve,

and how we are going to do that, so I would say,

this is not the issue because the most difficult, was to get here.

Now, we have to present the deal to the leaders and,

they would have to see that this is convincing enough to take the other steps and the rest is the matter of, of procedure.

And I can promise you that once we have that endorsement, we are starting to, to work, ASAP, the first thing after we arrived back in Brussels and you know that leaders would have the first look at this,

negotiated solutions and shared understanding already next Thursday, so that would be for us, clearly, you know,

the time when they'll look at it, assess it, and then we'll start, to act and put all the procedures in place. The New York Times.

A question from Keith Bradsher New York Times.

How does your plug-in hybrid deal differ from your agency's deal a dozen years ago on solar panels with China?

Is this also allowing the Chinese side to decide who sells at a markup for reduced number of vehicles in the European Union? Thank you.

I think, it would be very difficult for me to compare the details between the solar panels and,

and, plugging hybrids at this stage.

There was a different phase and, at that time,

we are living in completely different, and much more turbulent, world, today.

But we have seen the, the dramatic increase, of the exports of hybrids and plug-in hybrids to the European Union,

so it was, for us, absolutely imperative that, that we have to, that we have to act.

We Presented the case to our Chinese counterparts and, and explained very clearly that, the, the parameters of the export search in certain products from China to European Union go well beyond traditional trade optics, because,

We are in a situation that they could put under threat the whole sectors in European industry, literally thousands of jobs,

and, and the public opinion and the leaders clearly expect very fast action from, from our side.

And, And I am glad to say that the, the, the Chinese partners appreciated this very strong political argument and therefore we can proceed through the negotiated solution and as I said,

if it comes to the techniques and procedures,

we'll be very happy to inform you in full details once we have the clearance by the leaders to proceed.

I'll go to this side, the gentleman over here, South China Morning Post. Hi, thank you.

This is Debey from the South China Morning Post. I've got a question on rare earths.

Is the agreement on rare earths sufficient for the EU, and is it enough to stop a trade war between the EU and China?

Can you, can you repeat the last part of your question, please?

Is it enough to stop a trade war between the EU and China?

First and foremost, we never, we have never spoken about the trade wars, and you probably heard me saying that, I, I'm one of those,

who knows that sometimes it's very easy to declare a trade war or any war, but it's very difficult to stop it.

So therefore, I put so much emphasis on negotiations,

and I'm glad that, today I can present, to you, the outcome.

If it comes to the rare earth, we went, through a few critical moments, the, the last year.

And I have to say that we reconvened already at that time on the level with the Minister Wang Wentao immediately and we had several meetings on this issue already the,

the, the last year.

So, we've been working on, together with our direct personal involvement to make sure that, fast track procedure is put in place,

And that guaranteed the,

the necessary supply of the rarers and permanent magnets for the European industry.

What we are looking into right now is how to make it even smoother, more user friendly for, the, the, the European companies, which would bring more transparency and predictability for this very important supply chain,

and, I believe that through that understanding we have achieved we are accomplishing that, and,

I believe that European industry would be very much welcoming these additional steps, in that direction. Hero. Good evening.

This is Matthias Mann from Swiss daily newspaper NTZ.

The joint statement talks about price undertakings for electric vehicles.

Could you go a bit more in detail? Is there a time frame?

Could you, could you quantify, these, these price undertakings, provide us with a few figures?

I think that if you, if you follow this topic and I know that it's extremely, extremely technical, but what is very important to say that, of course,

we spent quite some time on, discussing this issue, especially when the so-called countervailing duties been,

introduced in, this segment from the side of the European European Union.

There was an interest from some companies to look into the possibility of price undertaking and therefore we issued the guidelines in January of this year,

how these procedures would work, what are the parameters, how, how this would deliver.

And this was further discussed and I, and reconfirmed by our side that the guidelines that we issued in January are still in place,

still in place, are still valid.

So I would, refer you to these guidelines and if there is a need for further technical clarification,

we'll be very happy to provide you from, expert level.

Let me take one more question, Bloomberg, please. Thank you, Commissioner. I'm Linda Gail from Bloomberg News.

I want to ask, you mentioned, about ensuring these, trade agreements will be WTO compliant.

Can you please go into more details about what this means?

Will there be additional safeguards that you'll be looking, to make sure that these are compliant with WTO rules? Thank you.

Yes, as I said, I mean, if it comes to the concrete technique and, and procedure, we'll have to reserve more details for later because first we have to present it to, to the leaders of the European Union institutions and,

and the member states, but I really would like to reassure you when we went,

into the great detail with Minister Wang Wentao and his team to make sure that the procedure we are proposing.

I, WTO compliant, fully, fully compatible, and it's based on the negotiated solutions and as I said,

once we have a clearance from the leaders, we will, we will proceed, ASAP to accomplish that.

If you, if you bear with me, so one really final question Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.

Thank you very much and sorry to keep you awake so long in Beijing.

About the hybrid car, if I understood correctly, it is about -50% over the next 4 years. What is the base for that?

The sales of this year, sales of last year.

Could you elaborate a little bit on these figures? Thanks.

Of course, in, in, these situations, you are, you are working with the trade flows, you are working with the, with the.

With the projections, so we are looking, we are looking at the, at the period of 4 years,

and according to the projection we have, that's more than halving of the,

exports of hybrids and plugging hybrids into the. European Union under no change scenario.

So I think by, by, by this step, we're actually preventing several millions of, cars, exports from China to the European Union and therefore,

I think you've already seen that, ASEA, which is Automobile Association of European carmakers,

already, welcome, this, step and welcomes the agreement.

Thank you for these important and detailed explanations, Commissioner.

Thank you for coming at this late hour.

We'll let you rest now and to everyone, good evening.

Thank you very much for waiting for us. Thank you all the best. Bye bye.