Bananas granted quota-tariff free access in EU

Banana is among the list of goods and services entering the European Union (EU) from African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries that all existing tariffs and quota limitations will be removed. This was confirmed by the first secretary and head of trade, economics, politics and information at the European Commission (EC) delegation to Jamaica, Carlo Pettinato.

In April the EU announced a proposal to grant easier preferential access to goods and services from the group of developing countries as part of a new Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA), but there was some uncertainty in CARIFORUM as to whether bananas were included among the list of goods and services.

The new offer to grant even further preferential access to commodities such as banana, comes at a time when Latin America have been challenging the preferential arrangement by lobbying the World Trade Organisation (WTO) to force the EU to end it.

The new EPA under negotiation is scheduled to come into effect in January 2008 and will replace the existing Cotonou Agreement.