The EU yesterday proposed updating a WTO agreement on high-technology products to include new models and expand the list of products exempt from customs duties to neutralize a complaint from the US, Japan and Taiwan.
“We need an ITA [Information Technology Agreement] for the 21st century that will continue to benefit our consumers and businesses,” EU Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson said in a statement.
The existing ITA dates from 1996 and prohibits duties on certain high-technology products.
But the US, Japan and Taiwan claim the EU is violating WTO rules by imposing duties on imports of certain products such as “cable boxes that can access the Internet, flat-panel computer monitors, and certain computer printers that can also scan, fax and/or copy.”
The US estimates that worldwide exports of these products amounted to more than US$70 billion last year.
Brussels proposes updating and extending the ITA “within a matter of months, not years,” saying the current agreement “has reached its limits” and does not take into account the technological developments of the past 12 years.
The EU Commission said that updating the ITA “would provide an additional boost in trade in these products and be the best way to address the increasing challenges of technological development and convergence.”
“The Commission has maintained that a change in ITA criteria can only be made on the basis of consensus amongst all ITA participants, as provided by the agreement itself, and not as a result of litigation by some members,” it added.
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