By Doug Palmer
WASHINGTON, March 11 (Reuters) - The United States needs to broaden its efforts to pressure China to raise the value of its currency by enlisting other major developed and developing countries in the cause, a U.S. lawmaker said on Wednesday.
"Our bilateral efforts have had little success so far and it's time for the administration to take a more multilateral approach," said Rep. Sander Levin, chairman of the House of Representatives Ways and Means trade subcommittee.
"The next step for the administration is to raise the issue of imbalances at the April summit, the G20 summit in London," Levin said in a speech on his trade agenda for 2009.
The Michigan Democrat is one of the biggest critics of China's trade policies in Congress and has called for the United States to file a complaint about China's currency practices at the World Trade Organization.
President Barack Obama will discuss actions countries can take to reverse the global economic downturn at the April 2 G20 meeting with leaders from China, Germany, Brazil, France, India, Britain, South Africa and other nations.
The administration of former President George W. Bush pressed China through a bilateral forum known as the "strategic economic dialogue" to move to a market-oriented exchange rate, and achieved some success.
But many lawmakers believe China's renminbi, also known as the yuan, still remains undervalued against the dollar, giving Chinese companies an unfair price advantage in international trade.
European officials also have raised concerns about the renminbi. But major developed country finance ministers adopted a softer tone on the issue at a G7 meeting last month to avoid hiking tensions with China at a time of global economic strife.
A plunge in Chinese exports as result of the global crisis also has raised concerns China could devalue the renminbi to keep its economy afloat.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, who was scheduled to meet on Wednesday with Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi, upset Beijing earlier this year when he said China was manipulating its currency.
However, U.S. officials later explained that Geithner was merely repeating what Obama had said during the campaign and the new U.S. administration had not made a formal finding on the issue.
The Treasury Department is due to release its annual report of the currency practices of trading partners on April 15. But that report is often delayed.
Levin, who was insistent that the Bush administration label China as a currency manipulator, stopped short of demanding the Obama administration do so on Wednesday.
"Let them have a chance to look at that issue. The deadline is still a month away," Levin said.
But the veteran lawmaker said he expected concerns about China's trade and currency policies to "be very much on the agenda" for Congress this year.
(Reporting by Doug Palmer; editing by Philip Barbara)