Search Results for: China

BY MONICA DOBIE
THE CANADIAN tobacco industry is poised on the brink of major change, with the country’s manufacturers considering comprehensive leaf import programmes that could undermine the sustainability of the country’s domestic growing sector.

This change is being lead by the country’s largest cigarette manufacturer, Imperial Tobacco Canada, which outlined a proposal in the spring of 2004 that would alter the current two-tiered pricing system for domestic and exported tobacco leaf in the 2005/2006 season.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has identified three priority countries as sources of counterfeit cigarette and other tobacco goods as the focus of special diplomatic efforts to pressure their governments to deal with the problem. China, the Ukraine and Brazil will receive encouragement and advice from Brussels on fighting counterfeiting.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has proposed that a Euro 3,479 per tonne anti-dumping duty on coumarin imports from China is extended to shipments from India or Thailand to prevent Chinese exporters illegally diverting this additive to avoid the tariff.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
CHINA has signed the first Kyoto Protocol Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) emissions trading project cutting methane gas pollution from coal mines. The scheme involves the Jincheng Anthracite Coal Group Co. Ltd. capturing coalmine methane for power generation at the Sihe coalmine, Jincheng City, Shanxi province, north-western China.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
HONDURAS has won a disputes case at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) with the Dominican Republic being ruled in breach of WTO rules by unfairly restricting the import of Honduran cigarettes. A disputes panel found fault with a special foreign exchange fee, an “economic stabilisation surcharge” and an insistence that importers physically fix within the Dominican Republic tax stamps to packs.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE INSTITUTIONS of the European Union (EU) always say they are getting a handle on the fraud that riddles their operations, but are they? Keith Nuthall looks at the latest annual report from EU fraud-fighters OLAF.

MEASURING fraud is notoriously difficult, given that the aim of this crime is to be as undetectable as possible.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
AS a truly global criminal problem, it is only right that fighting money laundering is a key priority of the United Nations (UN). Its general assembly and key committees have made declarations and approved conventions on the subject, and its specialist agencies have also devoted time, money, specialist staff and energy to fighting the problem.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has been told to monitor clothing import flows into the European Union (EU) for one year after restrictive import quotas end on January 1, alerting EU ministers to booms maybe harming European producers. The EU Council of Ministers may then approve temporary safeguard duties, especially against Chinese clothing imports, hindering importers wanting a completely free hand under the incoming liberal World Trade Organisation regime.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) has confirmed that countries in its eastern Europe and central Asia area of focus are booming because of high oil prices. Its annual 2004 Transition Report says Russia and the Ukraine are experiencing “skyrocketing annual growth”, making the former Warsaw Pact the world’s second-fastest-growing region (up 6.1%), next to China and its southern neighbours.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has identified eight priority countries as sources of counterfeit goods as the focus of special diplomatic efforts to pressure their governments to deal with the problem. China, Thailand, the Ukraine, Russia, Brazil, Turkey, South Korea and Indonesia will receive encouragement and advice on fighting counterfeiting.…