According to the official website of the Cabinet of Ukraine on the 13th news, Ukraine’s first Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy Yulia Sviridenko announced on the same day that the European Council (EU Council) finally agreed to extend the preferential policy of “tariff-free trade” of Ukrainian goods exported to the EU for 12 months.
Sviridenko said the extension of the EU’s trade preference policy, which starts in June 2022, was a “crucial political support” for Ukraine and “the full trade freedom policy will be extended until June 2025.”
Sviridenko stressed that “the EU and Ukraine have agreed that the extension of the autonomous trade preference policy will be the last time” and that by next summer, the two sides will revise the trade rules of the association agreement between Ukraine and the EU before Ukraine’s accession to the EU.
Sviridenko said that thanks to the EU’s trade preferential policies, most Ukrainian goods exported to the EU are no longer subject to the association agreement restrictions, including the association agreement in the applicable tariff quotas and access price provisions of the 36 categories of agricultural food, in addition, all Ukrainian industrial exports no longer pay tariffs, no longer the implementation of anti-dumping and trade protection measures against Ukrainian steel products.
Sviridenko pointed out that since the implementation of the trade preference policy, the volume of trade between Ukraine and EU has grown rapidly, especially the surge in the number of some products passing through the EU neighbors, leading the neighboring countries to take “negative” measures, including closing the border, although Uzbekistan has made multiple efforts to reduce trade frictions with EU neighbors. The extension of the EU’s trade preferences still includes “special safeguard measures” for Ukraine’s export restrictions on corn, poultry, sugar, oats, cereals and other products.
Sviridenko said Ukraine would continue to work on eliminating temporary policies that “run counter to trade openness.” At present, the EU accounts for 65% of Ukraine’s trade exports and 51% of its imports.
According to a statement released on the website of the European Commission on the 13th, in accordance with the results of the vote of the European Parliament and the resolution of the Council of the European Union, the EU will extend the preferential policy of exempts Ukrainian goods exported to the EU for one year, the current preferential policy of exemptions expires on June 5, and the adjusted trade preferential policy will be implemented from June 6 to June 5, 2025.
In view of the “adverse impact” of the current trade liberalization measures on the markets of some EU member states, the EU has decided to introduce “automatic safeguard measures” on imports of “sensitive agricultural products” from Ukraine, such as poultry, eggs, sugar, oats, corn, crushed wheat and honey.
The EU’s “automatic safeguard” measures for imports of Ukrainian goods stipulate that when the EU imports of Ukrainian poultry, eggs, sugar, oats, corn, ground wheat and honey exceed the annual average of imports from July 1, 2021 and December 31, 2023, the EU will automatically activate the import tariff quota for the above goods from Ukraine.
Despite the overall decline in Ukrainian exports as a result of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, two years after the implementation of the EU’s trade liberalization policy, Ukraine’s exports to the EU have remained stable, with EU imports from Ukraine reaching 22.8 billion euros in 2023 and 24 billion euros in 2021, the statement said.
Post time: May-16-2024