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BRUSSELS, JANUARY 22: The European Union has agreed to fast-track its new trade access regime for developing countries in a bid to help tsunami-hit states in the Indian Ocean, the EU executive Commission said on Friday.
The Commission, in charge of trade policy for the 25-nation bloc, will implement the new scheme in April instead of July 1.
"Under the new regime, Sri Lanka is due to benefit from duty free access to the EU for all its ... products, including textiles," the Commission said in a statement.
"India, Indonesia and Thailand will benefit from improved market access conditions, in particular for fishery products."
EU trade representatives from the 25-nation bloc agreed to the Commission's proposal at a meeting in Brussels.
But aid organisation Oxfam criticised the planned reform of the EU's Generalised System of Preferences (GSP) -- a regime where developing states get reduced or zero duty levied on exports to the bloc -- saying it would still hurt poor states.
"Indonesia and India will be excluded a priori from accessing the GSP special incentive scheme for sustainable development as their exports constitute more than one percent of GSP-covered trade," it said in a letter to EU trade diplomats. |