Six months after the safeguard clause reintroducing normal customs duties on Indica rice was triggered, the European market was hit hard by the negative effects of duty-free imports of milled Japonica rice from Burma, warned EU agricultural organisations and cooperatives (Copa-Cogeca) in a letter sent on 1 July to Commissioner Phil Hogan (see EUROPE 12170/21).
EU farm organisations therefore consider it “essential and urgent to protect the European rice sector” against imports of milled Japonica rice from Burma, which, according to Commission services' figures, reached 58,029 tonnes (t) in the first nine months of 2018/2019, compared to 24,014 t in the same period of the previous season and 4,917 t in 2016/2017.
This “exponential growth”, supported by prices well below European ones, could, if it continues at this rate, “lead to the collapse of Japonica rice production in the EU”, a variety that currently represents 75% of total Community production and for which the Union is self-sufficient, explains Copa-Cogeca. It also criticises the “cumulative impact” of other EU trade concessions in the rice sector: 80,000 t per year under the agreement with Vietnam and 60,000 t after six years (EU/Mercosur agreement). (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)