EU Seeks Reduced Eastern Europe Sugar Quota Requests

In June the EU sent a formal response to the accession candidates - Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Estonia - inviting them to reconsider their requests for quotas. The EU told the applicants that decisions on annual production quota were based on historical production figures, EU commitments to World Trade Organization rules and the need to avoid adding to EU market surpluses. Poland sought a sugar quota of 1.886 million tons, of which 20,000 tons was requested for isoglucose. Hungary asked for a quota of 620,000 tons, with 140,000 to be allocated to isoglucose. The Czech Republic and Estonia sought 505,000 and 75,000 tons respectively.