Brussels, 12/01/2012 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission awarded export licences (for 2011-2012) on Thursday 12 January for 650,000 tonnes of out-of-quota sugar. Since the level of applications (1.6 million tonnes) exceeded the volume available, the Commission will apply an acceptance percentage of 38.47%. Thus, an operator who entered a bid for a licence of 10,000 tonnes will be awarded a licence for 3,847 tonnes. These 650,000 tonnes come on top of the 700,000 for which export licences were awarded in December 2011. This means that the limit of 1.350 million tonnes set by the World Trade Organisation (WTO) has been reached.
At the Management Committee, the Commission also accepted tenders for exceptional imports into the EU: 40,000 tonnes of raw sugar for refining at a minimum tariff of €270.16 per tonne. The Commission believes that the EU market should now be sufficiently well supplied. It decided to suspend all the remaining tenders planned in January and February. It will, however, continue to monitor the market closely. (LC/transl.rt)