A fairer trade environment is disparately needed to assure the progress of financial globalization, economists say.

Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Co-operation Vice-President Chen Jingwen said a fair global trade system is essential for sustainable development, boosted by growing economic integration.

"We should point out the development will not be sustainable until the moment when the developing world is integrated in an efficient and equitable way in the global economy," he said.

But a failure in providing fair trading rules will block the integration of developing countries into the global economy, Chen added.

"Without fairness, globalization is likely to generate harmful effects for the environment and society," he said.

With the development of economic globalization and a subsequent rise in trade protection around the world, there is a marked increase of abuse of anti-dumping laws for trade protection purposes.

Reshaping rules is at the top of the agenda of the Doha round of World Trade Organization (WTO) talks, and voices for improving anti-dumping rules have been rising.

A number of members, including Japan and the Republic of Korea (ROK), have asked the WTO to make anti-dumping procedures more transparent, equitable and affordable to small and medium-sized businesses, and prevent abuse of such measures.

But the United States has long held a resistant stance over the review of anti-dumping rules.

Yang Rongzhen, a researcher with the China Institute for WTO Studies said the abnormal increase in anti-dumping cases worldwide magnifies the unreasonable side of the WTO's current anti-dumping rules, making these rules open to misuse.

The yearly number of anti-dumping cases has surged from a annual average of 138 in the 1980s to 237 in the 1990s, and 362 in 2001 alone.

Critics say anti-dumping actions, mostly used by major powers, are aimed at reducing pressure on local manufacturers from low-priced imports from developing countries.

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