Cambodian rice exports to EU set to revert to zero tariff from January 18

Cambodian rice exports to EU set to revert to zero tariff from January 18

According to S&P Global Platts expectations, the EU Commission’s Directorate General for Trade has confirmed to that the EU’s import tariffs on Cambodian and Myanmar long grain white rice will revert to zero from January 18.

Cambodia is set to benefit from its place within the EU’s Everything but Arms initiative, which allows Least Developed Countries to export to the bloc tariff-free. However, tariffs were brought in three years ago as a temporary measure to help protect EU farmers from competitively priced long grain rice.

Medium grain, short grain and broken rice — in addition to brown long grain — imports from these countries were unaffected.

The tariffs led to a substantial shift in the flow of rice to Europe. Cambodian Fragrant rice faced much more competition in the continent from Thai Fragrant rice and many EU buyers switched to buying the Myanmar medium grain variety, Kayinma, instead of the regular Emata long grain variety.

While Cambodia’s government challenged the tariffs in the courts, there was also pressure on the EU side to go further and extend the tariffs to other rice products from both countries and to make the temporary tariff changes permanent or at least extend them.

However, in a statement from DG Trade, a spokesperson confirmed to Platts that “the rice tariffs for Cambodia and Myanmar will return to zero at the expiry date (18/01/2022).”

The EU’s import tariffs on Cambodian and Myanmar rice during this period were Eur175/mt ($198/mt) in the first year, Eur150/mt ($170/mt) in the second year and Eur125/mt ($142/mt) in the third year. spglobal.com/Khmer Times