The Chinese Ministry of Commerce has said it will hold a hearing as part of its investigation into alleged dumping of pork products by the EU.

Last month, China announced new duties on its imports of pork from a raft of EU pig processors, including a number of Irish companies.

The country's Ministry of Commerce announced the tariffs as part of what it called a 'preliminary ruling' on its anti-dumping investigation into EU pork and pork by-products.

The Ministry of Commerce said at the time that its investigation has preliminarily determined that there was dumping of imported pork and pork by-products from the EU, and that the Chinese pig industry has suffered damage as a result.

Now, the ministry has said it will hold a hearing as part of its investigation, at the request of the European Commission and ICAPORC, a group representing the French pork industry.

The Ministry of Commerce said it was organising the hearing to "ensure the fairness, impartiality, and transparency of the investigation process".

The authorities in China did not confirm a date for the hearing, saying it would be "in the near future".

The content of the hearing will be related to dumping, injury and the causal relationship between the two in the preliminary ruling of the case, the ministry said.

Interested parties applying to attend the hearing were instructed to fill out an application form, and stakeholders had until yesterday to submit that form.

The Ministry of Commerce said it reserves the right to deny stakeholders admission to the hearing, and the right to refuse to accept the relevant materials submitted by those stakeholders, if the application form was not submitted in time.

Parties wishing to take part in the hearing were also asked to submit a written summary of their remarks and their evidence. The designated language and text of the hearing will be Chinese.

The Ministry of Commerce will decide how much speaking time each participant in the hearing will get.

The ministry is set to announce which stakeholders will participate in the hearing, and the time and location of the hearing, in due course.