The EU sugar quota is reduced
On October 1st the European Commission adopted a regulation reducing EU sugar quotas by 862,475 tonnes. The combined 'A' and 'B' sugar quotas will fall by 5.71% from 15,103,585 tonnes to 14,241,110 tonnes for 2003 (the only difference between 'A' and 'B' quotas lies in the levies charged to cover the cost of export refunds). According to the Commission 'the reduction is necessary to bring the EU in conformity with their WTO obligations'. The regulation also cuts EU refiners' 'maximum supply needs'. This will result in a further reduction in ACP access under the special preferential sugar arrangement. In the mean time the German sugar analyst F.O. Licht suggests that EU raw sugar production will reach 18.41 million tonnes in 2002/03 compared to 15.97 million tonnes in 2001/02. Comment: As can be seen there is rarely a correlation between the quotas allocated under the sugar regime and actual production. EU quota cuts will not necessarily have any impact on EU production. However, the reduction of the maximum supply needs will definitely result in lost export markets and lost revenues for ACP exporters. This comes at a time when the EU is looking for ACP support in the WTO against Brazilian and Australian challenges to the EU sugar regime.
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| Format: | News Item biblioteca |
| Language: | English |
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Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation
2002
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| Online Access: | https://hdl.handle.net/10568/52612 http://agritrade.cta.int/Back-issues/Agriculture-monthly-news-update/2002/November-2002 |
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