The European Union’s new meat quotas requirements for Russia, as a condition for gaining WTO membership, are impossible to fulfill, Russian Agriculture Minister Elena Skrynnik has said. Moscow-Brussels’ WTO membership issues currently defying compromises include disagreement over Russia’s new rules for automobiles industrial assembly, harmonization of phyto-sanitary and veterinary measures.
“The new requirements from EU are not feasible. This is because in addition to the issues that we had agreed on, the EU now wants us to ‘nullify’ customs duties on three more quotas, which is impossible as it will be tantamount to price dumping against our local producers.”
The minister’s fears stem from the fact that WTO accession could adversely affect domestic businesses in the agro, banking and other industrial sectors that might not be able to withstand competition from foreign companies.
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