Regulation 2010/642 - Rules of application (cereal sector import duties) for Council Regulation (EC) No 1234/2007 (codification) - Main contents

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

L 187/5

Commission Regulation (EC) No 1249/96 of 28 June 1996 on rules of application (cereal sector import duties) for Council Regulation (EEC) No 1766/92 (2) has been substantially amended several times (3). In the interests of clarity and rationality the said Regulation should be codified.

Article 135 of Regulation (EC) No 1234/2007 provides for the common customs tariff duties to be charged when the products referred to in Article 1 thereof are imported. However, for the products referred to in Article 136(1) of that Regulation, the import duty is to be the intervention price valid for these products at the time of importation, increased by 55 % and then reduced by the cif import price applicable to the consignment.

For the purposes of grading imported products, the products referred to in Article 136(1) of Regulation (EC) No 1234/2007 are, in certain cases, to be classed in several standard qualities. The standard qualities to be used should therefore be determined using objective grading criteria and tolerance rates should also be set allowing products to be given the most appropriate quality grading. Of the possible objective quality grading criteria for common wheat, protein content, specific weight and miscellaneous impurity (Schwarzbesatz) content are those most commonly used in the trade and also the easiest to use. For durum wheat, these criteria are specific weight, miscellaneous impurity (Schwarzbesatz) content and vitreous grain content. Imported goods are accordingly to be subjected to analysis to determine these parameters for each lot imported. However, where the Union has established an official recognition procedure for quality certificates issued by an authority of the country of origin of the goods, these analyses should be able to be carried out merely by way of verification on a sufficiently representative number of imported lots.

Article 136(2) of Regulation (EC) No 1234/2007 provides that for the purposes of calculating the import duty, representative cif import prices are to be established on a regular basis for the products referred to in paragraph 1 of that Article. For the establishment of these prices, the use must be stipulated of quotations for the several wheat qualities and for the other cereals. The actual quotation sources to be used should be specified.

The use of quotations for the various wheat types and for other cereals on the commodity exchanges of the United States of America will provide a basis both transparent and objective for establishing representative cif import prices. The addition of the commercial premium assigned on the United States market to each quality of the various cereals will allow the exchange quotation for each cereal to be converted into a fob export price from the United States of America. By the addition of sea freight costs between the Gulf of Mexico or the Great Lakes and a port of the Union that are quoted on the freight markets, these fob prices can be converted into representative cif import prices. Given the volume of freight passing through and the amount of trade at the port of Rotterdam, this port is the destination in the Union for which sea freight quotations are most...