Cars for cheese? New opportunities to clear
The Japan EU agreement (JEFTA) entered into force on 1st February 2019. Dubbed«Cars for cheese» deal by some commentators, it’s the largest bilateral trade pact ever negotiated by the European Union.
The Japan EU agreement (JEFTA) addresses to several sectors but, at this beginning phase, specifically targets the agriculture/food products (like meat, cheese, wine, chocolate) and the motor vehicles. Once the agreement is fully implemented, Japan will have scrapped customs duties on 97% of goods imported from the EU (in tariff lines), with the remaining tariff lines being subject to partial liberalisation through tariff rate quotas or tariff reductions.
As in occasion of the previous agreements with South Korea and Canada, the Japan EU agreement (JEFTA) doesn’t require the EUR1 certificate as proof of the preferential origin. The required documentation to ask for customs duties preferential treatment is:
- a declaration made by the exporter, in accordance with the model set out in the attachment 3D of the Agreement
- an alternative system of knowledge to certify the origin of the product arranged by the importer
In the first case, exporters in the EU must be registered in the REX system when issuing origin documentation (an origin statement) for export to Japan. If the value of consigned originating products is below EUR 6000, the exporting company does not need to be registered in the REX system.
It’s then possible to issue an origin statement both for a shipment concerning one or more products and for multiple shipments of same products over a period of time not exceeding 12 months.
In the second case, the importer can ask for the preferential tax treatment of the products by certifying its origin with a system of knowledge based on information and documentation provided by the exporter/producer (par. 2 art. 3.21 of the agreement). This documentation must be stored for three years.
The text of the agreement is available at the following link: http://trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/press/index.cfm?id=1684
http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_MEMO-18-6784_en.htm
Exporters and importers, are you ready to catch the opportunities generated by the Japan eu agreement (JEFTA)? Please don’t hesitate to contact us for your shipments from Europe/Italy to Japan or from Japan to Italy/Europe!
