Brussels, 25/07/2005 (Agence Europe) - On Monday, China's finance minister announced that Beijing is scrapping as from 1 August the export tax on 17 textile products subject to EU import quotas. The products in question are wool trousers for men and women and cotton and synthetic women's blouses. As at 1 January 2005, when textile quotas were lifted, China decided to levy an export tax on 148 categories of textile products, announcing on 30 May that the export tax would only be levied on 78 products in future (see EUROPE 8957). After the launch of formal consultations between Beijing and Brussels on T-shirts and linen shirts at the end of May, Beijing decided not to levy export tax on T-shirts or linen shirts. The Chinese finance minister said 51 categories of Chinese products were still subject to export tax. Questioned about this, European Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson said that this did not break the Shanghai Agreement of 10 June 2005 (see EUROPE 8967) restricting EU imports of ten categories of products until 31 December 2007. Claude Veron Revelle said that China's levying of an export tax was a way of restricting exports, but the EU no longer needed such restrictions from the Chinese authorities. He added that the EU would nevertheless check that the scrapping of the export tax on 17 products announced by Beijing does cover the 10 categories of products covered by the Shanghai Agreement.
On Monday, the European Commission confirmed its plan to issue no further import licences for pullovers from China as from 10 July 2005 because the quota for 2005 was exhausted in the very first month of the new system of restrictions.