Polish confectioners push for public support
The Polish confectionery industry is pushing the European Commission for a loosening of the rules allowing national European Union (EU) governments to give confectionery manufacturers financial assistance when buying sugar inputs.
A letter obtained by Confectionery Production from Polbisco ” the Association of Polish Chocolate and Confectionery Manufacturers ” has warned that last year’s abolition of EU export refunds for its products has been damaging overseas sales.
It noted that despite EU sugar liberalisation reforms “EU [sugar] market prices remain substantially higher than world market prices. While the export refund system used to at least partially compensate for the difference”¦this has now terminated.” It said “export opportunities are being lost” as a result, with “companies”¦increasingly moving production for export out of Europe”¦.” The situation was especially severe in Poland, said Polbisco, where there is a “sugar deficit” of approximately 200,000 tonnes per annum.
The European Commission is considering the issue of inward processing financing, and it was to be discussed at a customs code committee meeting on September 3. A reply to Polbisco from the Commission admitted “the suspension of the export refunds in the sugar sector”¦ might have caused temporary difficulties”¦.” However it argued that EU sugar prices were actually falling: they were around €725/tonne before 2006, and in the first quarter of 2009 were “around Euro 550-570/tonne.”
