{"id":39993,"date":"2021-04-09T20:25:33","date_gmt":"2021-04-09T18:25:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/?p=39993"},"modified":"2021-04-09T20:28:00","modified_gmt":"2021-04-09T18:28:00","slug":"uzbek-products-get-privileged-access-to-the-european-union-gsp-plus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/uzbekistan\/uzbek-products-get-privileged-access-to-the-european-union-gsp-plus\/","title":{"rendered":"Uzbek products obtain privileged access to the European Union"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>The European Union has officially added Uzbekistan to the list of countries benefiting from the GSP +. 6,200 Uzbek products will be able to access the European market without customs duties.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>This article was originally published on Novastan&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/novastan.org\/fr\/europe-et-asie-centrale\/les-produits-ouzbeks-obtiennent-un-acces-privilegie-a-lunion-europeenne\/\">French website<\/a> on 9 April 2021. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The European Commission <a href=\"https:\/\/trade.ec.europa.eu\/doclib\/press\/index.cfm?id=2263\">officially added<\/a> Uzbekistan to the list of countries benefiting from its Generalised System of Advanced Preferences (GSP +) this Friday, 9 April. Tashkent will be able to export 6,200 products to the European Union (EU) market without any import duties from 10 April.<\/p>\n\n\n<p style=\"background-color: #d4d4d4;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Want more Central Asia in your inbox? Subscribe to our newsletter <strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/2ff41361.sibforms.com\/serve\/MUIFAKS0hXNCcjFtbbcHdbJer3pXwcATF16qgsum6tyGvEoLgCq6WxavUIwFIL5eEtBRM4bkdWo7mhR1SC46O1OVL-kNQ3V6dDIMW2lW4yX07D38i9F5WPnDQ4DAntlKpsydvy7tqGoq93Wq0aDjvzmAy4QqjMEHX5pDsqLrfgyB9JJM_MlmNURoizq5Y9h8wB3nHnr5Lk_g0RP5\">here.<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Previously, Uzbekistan was on the GSP list, which allows exports of 3,000 goods without tariffs and 3,200 goods with reduced tariffs. Inclusion on the GSP + list therefore means a doubling in the number of products without tariffs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This statute received the green light from the European Commission on 30 November. The decision was then approved by the European Parliament and the European Council. Currently, <a href=\"https:\/\/ec.europa.eu\/trade\/policy\/countries-and-regions\/development\/generalised-scheme-of-preferences\/\">only 9 countries<\/a> benefit from it in the world, including Kyrgyzstan since 2016.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h5 class=\"has-black-color has-text-color wp-block-heading\">\u201cAn important step\u201d<\/h5>\n\n\n\n<p>In <a href=\"https:\/\/mift.uz\/ru\/news\/uzbekistan-prisoedinilsja-k-spetsialnomu-soglasheniju-evropejskogo-sojuza-gsp\">a statement<\/a>, the Uzbekistan&#8217;s Ministry of Investments and Foreign Trade welcomed the country\u2019s new status: <em>\u201cThis is an important step in the relations between the EU and Uzbekistan, which will further deepen dialogue as well as trade<\/em>.&#8221; The ministry organised an official event at a hotel in Tashkent to mark the occasion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>\u201cI am convinced that this status will give a powerful impetus to investors and representatives of the private sector, mainly from EU countries, in the implementation of promising projects in Uzbekistan,\u201d<\/em> the deputy prime minister and minister of investments, Sardor Umurzakov, said. The event was attended by the newly appointed EU Ambassador to Uzbekistan Charlotte Adriaen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h5 class=\"has-black-color has-text-color wp-block-heading\">In the background, a new agreement<\/h5>\n\n\n\n<p>According to a European source, SPG + is just one signal among many. In fact, obtaining this status does not detract from the fact that Uzbekistan is following a multi-directional approach combining Chinese investments and a rapprochement with the West with the EU and a potential membership of the World Trade Organisation, all the while keeping <a href=\"https:\/\/eng.belta.by\/politics\/view\/uzbekistan-cuba-granted-observer-status-at-eurasian-economic-union-135793-2020\/\">observer status<\/a> in the <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Eurasian_Economic_Union\">Eurasian Economic Union<\/a>, dominated by Russia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Read more on Novastan: <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/uzbekistan\/uzbekistan-towards-more-cooperation-with-iran\/\">Uzbekistan: towards greater cooperation with Iran?<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Uzbekistan is also in the process of negotiating Extended Partnership and Cooperation Agreements (EPCA) with the European Union. These agreements look to replace the <a href=\"https:\/\/eur-lex.europa.eu\/legal-content\/EN\/TXT\/?uri=celex%3A21999A0831%2801%29\">Partnership and Cooperation Agreement <\/a>(PCA) in effect since 1999. The EPCA has a much broader scope than the SPG + status, encompassing justice, trade, human rights as well as corruption and terrorism prevention.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As the Uzbek media <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gazeta.uz\/ru\/2021\/03\/05\/eu-delegation\/\">Gazeta.uz<\/a> notes, seven rounds of negotiations have already taken place on the EPCA <a href=\"https:\/\/www.consilium.europa.eu\/en\/press\/press-releases\/2018\/07\/16\/uzbekistan-eu-to-open-negotiations-on-new-comprehensive-agreement\/\">since they started in 2018<\/a>, while a final position is expected for the first half of 2021. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-right\"><strong>Etienne Combier<\/strong><br>Editor-in-chief of Novastan France<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-right\"><strong>Translated from French by Valentine Baldassari<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The European Union has officially added Uzbekistan to the list of countries benefiting from the GSP +. 6,200 Uzbek products will be able to access the European market without customs duties. This article was originally published on Novastan&#8217;s French website on 9 April 2021. The European Commission officially added Uzbekistan to the list of countries [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":81,"featured_media":39994,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[4093,4215,4038,3974],"coauthors":[81],"class_list":["post-39993","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uzbekistan","tag-european-union","tag-gsp","tag-trade","tag-uzbekistan"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39993","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/81"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39993"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39993\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39994"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39993"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39993"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39993"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=39993"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}