Search Results for: World Trade Organisation

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE UNITED Nations’ Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) is predicting the extinction of the virulent cattle disease rinderpest by a UN deadline of 2010. It is trying to eradicate the last traces of the virus in northeast Kenya and southern Somalia.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has ordered the British government to reform Gibraltar’s offshore company taxation rules by ensuring its ‘Exempt Company’ regime is phased out by December 2005 at the latest. Its action follows an inquiry, which led to the Commission concluding that the tax system constituted illegal state aid, banned under EU law because it unfairly favours one European company over another.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
IT is rare that an international organisation report on a scandal involving crime, corruption, war and environmental degradation names and shames high profile companies, but that is what is contained within the latest United Nations (UN) Security Council report on the Congo.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
A TURKISH-OWNED chain of Russian shopping malls and supermarkets is to receive a US$70 million loan from the World Bank’s International Finance Corporation to almost double the company’s retail space in the country. Ramenka already operates four shopping malls and 10 supermarkets in the Moscow area under the name Ramstore.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE NEW International Code for the Security of Ships and Port Facilities, agreed by an International Maritime Organisation (IMO) Diplomatic Conference, held in London, last month (Dec) aims at reducing the industry’s exposure to terrorist attacks and resulting damage.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
AGREEMENT in principle has been secured at the European Union (EU) Council of Ministers over a proposed EU Regulation writing into European law the International Maritime Organisation’s (IMO) convention on the control of harmful anti-fouling systems on ships, (AFS Convention).…

BY ALAN OSBORN
POLAND has agreed to reduce by 30 per cent its preferential duties on spirits and by 50 per cent the duties on vermouths under a deal reached with the European Commission. The agreement, initialled in Warsaw in October, was formally adopted by the Commission today (Friday) and if accepted by EU ministers will come into effect early next year.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
EUROPEAN collective wine marketing systems are “insufficient and ill-suited to market requirements compared to those of wine-growing companies in the

new world wine producing countries:” this is one of the main conclusions of a

seminar last week (28 and 29 November) organised by COPA-COGECA, the

association of European agricultural co-operative organisations and the

CEV, Europe’s association for the wine industry and trade.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
THE EUROPEAN Commission has ordered Italy to scrap a tax break regime for insurance and other financial companies wanting to trade in eastern Europe, claiming that it breaks EU state aid rules. It wants the Italian government to close its Trieste Financial Services and Insurance Centre; this special registration system was one of a number of similar arrangements initially approved by the Commission in 1995, which saw them as offering a way to enhance the development of financial markets in east European countries and the former Soviet Union.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
SUCCESSFUL negotiations between the European Commission and the governments of Cambodia and Nepal have led to a deal over the extension of existing textile trade agreements between these Asian kingdoms and the European Union (EU). The Commission has asked European ministers to formally agree that these agreements should be prolonged until December 2004, appending a new list of textile products that can be imported into the EU without any quota limits.…