Home >

EU To Reduce Import Tariffs On Raw Materials To Enhance Competitiveness Of Manufacturing Industry

2010/8/3 21:20:00 85

Recently, European media reported that Italy has recommended to the European Commission to reduce import tariffs on some raw materials and help European manufacturers overcome the difficulties. Salemi, Vice Minister of economic development of Italy, said: "this policy can help European manufacturers to buy raw materials at the same price as their competitors. In the current situation, this is no time for European manufacturers and consumers."

Reuters reporter revealed that

European Commission

In accordance with the proposal of Italy, a list of 92 kinds of raw materials has been secretly prepared to cancel or substantially reduce import tariffs, with a period of 2-3 years.

The specific products are food processing, medicine,

Cosmetics

* chemical and mineral materials in chips and packaging materials; materials needed for steel production and automobile manufacturing; sheep, cattle, pigs, horses and other livestock for leather production; tropical timber, pig iron, aluminum and 26 kinds of yarns and fabrics.

These raw materials involve iron and steel production, cosmetics production, shoemaking, textile manufacturing, furniture manufacturing, automobile manufacturing and other European dominant industries.

At present, the 27 European Union countries have not yet reached an agreement on the list.

Freedom of Britain, Holland, Sweden and Czech

Trade

The camp countries support Italy's proposal, while France, Germany and Spain are competing against Italy because of their similar manufacturing structure to Italy.

The media said that the policy of lowering import tariffs on raw materials and maintaining higher tariffs on manufactured goods may arouse vigilance in developing countries, or even exclude developing countries' relevant trade retaliatory measures in order to maintain their competitive edge.

An official of the European Commission, who does not want to be named, said that the European Commission could either overturn Italy's proposal or redraft a list, but unless all Member States reached a compromise, it would not be possible to formulate the policy at the EU level.

At present, Italy is using summer break time to concentrate on lobbying for France and Germany, but there is still a big gap between the two sides.

The media speculated that the European Commission could not win all Member States' support this autumn. The formulation of this policy is likely to drag on, and the final result is still hard to predict.