April 1 2005, 11:25 APK-Inform

AP Ministry opposes to reduction of export duty for sunseeds, despite Ukraine's WTO aspirations

Ukraine's Ministry of Agrarian Policy does not support the proposal of Economy Ministry about reduction of export duty for sunflower seeds (the current duty is 17 percent), AP Minister Olexandr Baranivsky told reporters on Thursday.

"European market is loaded with sunflower at 50 percent [of its capacity], thence, it has a need in the raw material. But we must export not raw materials, but ready products", - the minister said. He reminded that the currently operating crushing capacities of Ukrainian oil crushing industry were totalling about 6 million tonnes per annum.

As it has been earlier reported, Ukraine's Ministry of Economy develop a bill, proposing to set the export duty for sunflower, flax and false flax seeds in the amount of 16 percent of the customs value with its subsequent reduction it by 1 percent per year starting from January 1, 2007, until it reached the level of 10 percent. The Economy Ministry's experts think that the currently effective 17-percent export duty for the oilseeds is not a restrictive factor for their exports. The developers of the bill are arguing that in the future it will be possible to compensate the losses from reduction of export duty for oilseeds on account of expansion of the presence of Ukrainian goods, in particular - agricultural produce, on the new sales markets, which would become available after Ukraine's accession into WTO.

The issue of revision of existing rates of export duty for oilseeds in the downward direction has been persistently raised by WTO member countries in the course of the negotiation process as for accession of Ukraine into the organisation.