Thread by @Jim_Cornelius

HI @jonmoyni

This article provides no proper source for the 20% figure only a link for the Economist's for Free Trade front page.

Where does this 20% come from?

I hope that Jon Moynihan isn't upping the 17% figure that I comprehensively debunked here.

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This is complete nonsense. We already source fruit and vegetables from outside of the EU though free-trade deals Let's look at one example. Next Tweet.

Leguminous vegetables (peas and beans). We import 55% of it from Africa and it all comes in Tariff Free!

trademap.org/Country_SelPro…

Just to be clear that’s 55% of our imports come from Africa (37% from Kenya alone). Not 55% of we consume. I can’t check as I’m on the phone right now but I think between 13-17% of our imports of leguminous veg come from the rest of the EU.

Lets' look at another thing. Rice. OMG there's a €175 per tonne tariff on rice (code: 1006309490). Surely that puts the price up right?

Wrong! Click on the import tab and a different story emerges.

trade-tariff.service.gov.uk/trade-tariff/c…

For starters there's a non-preferential quota (TRQ) here on 0%, anything under quota from all of the countries in that tab (which is everywhere) are on 0% within that quota.

Then there's the 0% out of quota for countries and blocs where we have an FTA/EPA or a preferential trade arrangement with through GSP/EBA. All on 0%

Then there's these other countries that have country specific quota where it all comes in on 0%.

Basically none of this rice comes into the UK on a €175 tariff.

Simply quoting the MFN tariff doesn't tell you much. TRQs, FTAs and exceptions for developing nations are important.