Thread by @Jim_Cornelius

@MikeAnson @mkaftermidnight @_JamieWhyte "designed to exclude developing country producers in many product categories"

This is complete rubbish.

This is the UN"s list of Least Developed Countries from UNCTAD (United Nations Trade and Development).

unctad.org/en/Pages/ALDC/…

@MikeAnson @mkaftermidnight @_JamieWhyte Here is a map showing those same countries in blue. Botswana, in green, used to be on the list,

All of these countries automatically qualify for the EU's Everything But Arms programme (EBA) under which all of their exports enter the EU completely tariff-free and quota-free.

@MikeAnson @mkaftermidnight @_JamieWhyte EBA is part of the EU's Generalised System of Preferences (GSP) scheme. Various developed nations have their own version of GSP.

And here, from UNCTAD, is a document which describes each of those GSP programmes and the beneficiary countries.

unctad.org/en/Publication…

@MikeAnson @mkaftermidnight @_JamieWhyte The European Union's GSP, which includes EBA (also known as GSP Annex IV) has been in operation since 1971 and is the most generous.

The text here is from a report from the Executive Director of the Centre for Policy Dialogue in Bangladesh.

un.org/en/development…

@MikeAnson @mkaftermidnight @_JamieWhyte In addition to EBA and GSP many countries in the ACP Group have Economic Partnership Agreements with the EU meaning zero tariffs and quota on exports to the EU.

The ACP group was established in 1975 at the Lomé Convention and meet regularly with the EU.

acp.int/content/commun…

@MikeAnson @mkaftermidnight @_JamieWhyte And furthermore, a number of other countries in the developing world have bilateral free trade agreements with the EU or are in the process of negotiating such trade deals.

The EU has FTAs with 69 countries that are currently in force or in the case of Japan from 1/2/2019.

@MikeAnson @mkaftermidnight @_JamieWhyte With regards to sugar. The situation is quite the opposite. From the establishment of the EEC in 1957 sugar import from the 6 founder nations former colonies was imported into the EEC tariff free. This was extended to British possessions upon UK accession

tfocanada.ca/news.php?item=…

@MikeAnson @mkaftermidnight @_JamieWhyte In the 3rd Lomé convention in 1975 the Sugar Protocol the EEC guaranteed to buy sugar from ACP countries at above market prices. eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/…

@MikeAnson @mkaftermidnight @_JamieWhyte @iwitteronandon has looked Eurostat data for sugar imports and it shows that 97.2% of cane sugar imported into the UK in 2017 had ZERO TARIFF applied.

@MikeAnson @mkaftermidnight @_JamieWhyte @iwitteronandon This graph shows the range of ACP and LDC countires from which sugar is imported tariff free into the EU.

@MikeAnson @mkaftermidnight @_JamieWhyte @iwitteronandon And this is the same graph but showing where their product ends up.

Tate & Lyle, the American owned sugar refining corporation, who have a single sugar-refining facility in Silvertown reduced their imports of sugar from the ACP countries, but look where that sugar goes now.