The EU has approved the free trade agreement with Japan: duties on wine (among others) gone

The free trade agreement between the EU and Japan has become a reality. The EU Parliament has today given the green light and the agreement will go into effect on February 1, 2019. According to Agrinsieme, which unites Italian Cia -Farmers, Confagricoltura, Copagri and Alleanza delle Cooperative Agroalimentari, “it will bring important and immediate benefits to the Made in Italy agro-food sector. This agreement that was signed last July, and which is unlike CETA, the agreement with Canada, will not have to be approved by the Parliaments of the individual Member States, and consequently, European Union agro-food exports to the Land of the Rising Sun could increase appreciably for processed foods”.
The agreement also applies to wine and has established that duties will be eliminated, “which currently stand at around 15% on average”, pointed out Agrinsieme.
The Italian Wines Union is also applauding the agreement, according to which it is "the largest treaty the European Union has ever negotiated, and which will create a free trade zone that will benefit more than 600 million people. The agreement represents a positive message against the political modus operandi based on unilateralism and protectionism in this particular historical moment”.
The agreement, as the Italian Wines Union, UIV, has stated, will allow Europe to fill the competitive gap with other non-EU exporters (such as Australia and Chile) and will certainly have an indispensable flywheel effect on the entire sector. It will bring concrete benefits to European companies, such as the immediate elimination of customs duties, thereby generating savings of over 112 million euros annually at the EU level; the authorization of oenological practices not yet recognized by Japanese law; safeguarding geographical indications, since 100 European PDO and IGP wines will have the same level of protection as provided by European legislation, and the elimination of all costs associated with the registration of Italian IG in Japan, so as to facilitate protection. These results fully satisfy the requests that the sector had advanced starting from the first stages of negotiations and they represent a particularly significant milestone for European wine".
There is not only wine, though. As a matter of fact, “the current customs tariffs, even for many cheeses, which reach 30%”, Agrinsieme emphasized, “will be suppressed”. Additionally, for some soft cheeses, including mozzarella, a quota of zero-duty exports has been agreed upon. Moreover, the duty exemption for EU exports of processed pork has also been provided, and further, customs tariffs will also be phased out for a number of processed products, including pasta, the confectionery industry and some tomato by-products. The agreement will also guarantee the protection of a long list of quality European agricultural products on the Japanese market, 45 of which are Italian, while 10 of these make up 90% of the value of national agro-food exports to Japan. Finally, it should be remembered that this is the largest trade agreement of economic dimension the European Union has ever signed. According to the EU Commission, sector exports could indeed double compared to the current 6.6 billion euros a year”, concluded Agrinsieme.