EU Agrees To Retain Trade Preferences In Developing Countries

In August 4th, the European Commission welcomed the EU Member States' implementation of the EU Committee's GSP management system from January 2009 to the end of 2011.

This decision will allow the EU to retain preferential access to the 176 developing countries in the EU market.

The newly revised Pratt & Whitney system will be changed and improved to ensure that the GSP will benefit the most needed countries.

GSP provides real economic value to developing countries. The volume of trade completed under the GSP framework in 2007 was 57 billion euros.

According to the re calculation of trade development, the preferential treatment of the special products group of six GSP preferential countries (Algeria, India, Indonesia, Russia, South Africa and Thailand) will be redefined. The benefits of XII products (shoes and some other products) of one country (Vietnam) will be suspended.

These adjustments are automatically activated when a country's discount in the EU market exceeds or falls below a certain threshold.

This process restrictive rules, so as to ensure that GSP preferential treatment benefits those countries most in need.

Preferential suspension is known as "graduation", reflecting the competitiveness of a suspected product in a certain country to the EU market.

In addition to the GSP standard, the EU also proposes a special incentive arrangement for sustainable development and good management, known as the GSP+ arrangement.

GSP+ provides additional concessions to support weaker developing countries to help them ratify and improve relevant international human rights and labor rights, environmental protection and good governance.

Interested countries will apply before October 31st this year, so as to benefit from the GSP+ discount in January 2009.

Everything but Arms is also preserved, except for weapons. This is the zero tariff and zero quotas system provided by the EU to the least developed countries. The system is also incorporated into the GSP management framework.