Poland receives a draft EU regulation extending the import ban on Ukrainian food
WARSAW (Reuters) – Poland’s agriculture minister has received a draft regulation from the European Commission extending the import ban on some Ukrainian food products until September 15, he said on Monday.
The EU imposed restrictions on imports of Ukrainian wheat, corn, rapeseed and sunflower seeds on May 2-June 5 in a bid to reduce grain oversupply in Bulgaria, Hungary, Poland, Romania and Slovakia.
These countries had complained that cheaper Ukrainian grain was making domestic production unprofitable and asked the EU to extend the ban.
“We have received a draft new regulation from the EC banning the import of four products into the five countries,” Robert Telus wrote on Twitter. “The draft effective date is September 15 of this year.”
“It’s a draft but I hope it will come into force from tomorrow,” he added.
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A spokesman for the European Commission did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment.
Ukrainian wheat, corn, rapeseed and sunflower seeds can be sold to any other country in the 27-country bloc.
The EU previously liberalized all imports from Ukraine to help Kiev in its efforts to ward off the Russian invasion. The five countries became transit routes for Ukrainian grain, which could not be exported through the Black Sea ports because of the war.
During talks with EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on Thursday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called for the unconditional lifting of all export restrictions on Ukrainian agricultural products.
(Reporting by Alan Charlish and Pawel Florkiewicz in Warsaw, additional reporting by Charlotte Van Campenhout in Brussels, editing by William Maclean)
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