Brussels, 27/11/2008 (Agence Europe) - The Appelate Body of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) said on the evening of Wednesday 26 November that the EU banana import system contravened international trade rules. The Appelate Body once again found for the United States and Ecuador which had challenged what they considered to be the excessively high customs duty imposed by the EU on imported bananas. The WTO, thus, upheld the decisions made in April, in the case of Ecuador, and May, in the case of the United States, against which the EU had appealed on 28 August (see EUROPE 9664).
The European Union “accepts the ruling of the Appelate Body” and considers the Doha Round on trade liberalisation to be “the right forum” to find a resolution to this problem, the European Commission says. It says it is ready to resume negotiations on a deal on bananas with all suppliers “where they were left in July” in order to settle this long-standing dispute once and for all. A compromise between the EU and Latin American producers had practically been finalised in July at the last WTO ministerial meeting (see EUROPE 9706). Under that agreement, which lapsed a few days later with the collapse of the Doha Round negotiations, the EU would have agreed to reduce its customs duties on bananas that did not come from ACP (Africa, Caribbean, Pacific) countries to €114 (compared with €176 currently) by 2016. The EU, which has lost several cases, is criticised for favouring ACP banana producers, whose exports are not subject to customs duties in Europe. In its defence, the Commission said that the preferences given to ACP countries had been granted since 1 January 2008 by economic partnership agreements of interim agreements that met WTO requirements. The WTO did not accept this argument. (E.H./transl.rt)