The most sensitive sectors include beef, poultry and sugar. To protect them from foreign competition the agreement:
- sets limits, or ‘quotas’, on how much can be imported
- gradually reduces the import tariffs
The EU can quickly stop or limit these imports if an increase causes, or even only threatens to cause, serious injury to the relevant EU sectors. Close monitoring of the level of imports is also done to be able to investigate any concern.
For example:
Beef: 99,000 tons of beef imported from Mercosur will benefit from a reduced tariff of 7.5%. This represents the equivalent of 1.5% of the current EU beef production. It therefore means that only a very small amount of Mercosur beef (equivalent of 1.5% of the EU production) will enter the EU market at reduced duties, while there will be no duty-free quota for beef.
Poultry: 180,000 tons of poultry imported from Mercosur will benefit from the elimination of duties, to be phased in over 5 years. This means that only the equivalent of 1.3% of the current EU production of poultry will benefit from the elimination of tariffs, and it will be done in a gradual and monitored way.
Ethanol: 450,000 tons of ethanol imported from Mercosur will benefit from the elimination of duties. This will strictly be limited to the chemical industry use.
Rice: 60,000 tons of rice imported from Mercosur will benefit from the elimination of duties, to be phased in over 5 years. The EU is not self-sufficient in its rice production, as it produces less than 50% of its rice needs.
Honey: 45,000 tons of honey imported from Mercosur will benefit from the elimination of duties, to be phased in over 5 years. It will be done in a gradual and monitored way.
