Archive

KEITH NUTHALL
CONCERN has been aired at a Forest Based Industries Forum meeting in Stockholm about the EU White Paper on renewable energy, which highlights the use of wood products in power generation. While participants from the timber sector stressed that they “were keen to see an increasing role for forestry,” there were worries that this could distort the market.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Union Council of Ministers has agreed to allow yet another Member State to stretch the agreement underlying the new common market organisation in wine, by approving a large national handout for compulsory distillation. In a move that it likely to dismay the European Commission, ministers agreed to allow France to grant exceptional national aid to producers for distillation of 1.5 million hectolitres of wine.…

Keith Nuthall
A FRENCH government state aid system for producers of liqueur wines and spirits, funding promotional measures, research, technical support and investment, is under threat, because of a European Court of Justice ruling that it should never have been sanctioned by the European Commission.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
THE EUROPEAN Commission is to open an in-depth investigation into the planned acquisition of the Austrian man-made fibres group Lenzing by the London-based multinational CVC Capital Partners Group. The latter company already controls Acordis, which produces man-made fibres for industrial, textile, medical and hygiene applications in Austria.…

Keith Nuthall
THE EUROPEAN Union has promised to “significantly improve” its import quota and tariff arrangements for cotton exports from Egypt under an Association Agreement that has recently been signed by Brussels and Cairo. However European Commission officials told Textile Month that there was unlikely to be any dramatic increases in Egyptian shipments because of concessions already made by the EU to Egypt in recent years under a pre-existing economic cooperation agreement.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
SPECIAL care should be taken to make sure that GM cotton fibres do not pose a health risk when used in medical products, the European Union’s Scientific Steering Committee, which advises the European Commission on legislation, has said.…

Keith Nuthall
A DISPUTES panel of the World Trade Organisation has recommended that the USA repeal safeguard duties that it has imposed on imports of Pakistani combed cotton yarn. The decision follows hearings sparked by the failure of the US to abide by a WTO Textile Monitoring Body recommendation that they should be scrapped.…

Keith Nuthall
THE TEXTILES Monitoring Body of the World Trade Organisation has asked the United States to confirm that textile and clothing imports that are to be subject of liberalised quotas, under the third stage of its implementation of the Agreement on Textiles and Clothing, will be free of visa restrictions that have been applied in the past.…

KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has launched formal state aid investigations into the purchase of overpriced shares by the Walloon regional government, of Belgium, from the Flemish carpet manufacturer Beaulieu.

Officials consider that the payment was in effect a debt write-off, as Beaulieu settled a debt of BEF 113.7 million owed to the regional government by transferring 9,704 shares in the Holding Verlipack II company, also of Belgium.…

BY MONICA DOBIE
CANADIAN furriers are expecting international demand for fur garments will drive Canadian exports up 10-15 per cent this year, to more than CAN$350-million according to the country’s National Post newspaper.

Alan Herscovici, executive vice-president of the Fur Council of Canada, said fur does not have the negative connotations it used to.…