Estonia imposes duty on Polish pork in spite of EU advice

Protective measures against cheap pork imports from Poland will come into force in the next few days. A decision to this end, as a matter of principle, was taken at the government meeting last night, will next be officially formulated and Polish pork will until the end of the year come under double duties, instead of the current zero rate. The Ministry of Agriculture sees this as not running into conflict with the recommendation from the European Commission, which says that future member states should not start protecting their meat markets. Poland, however, has threatened Estonia with countermeasures. Cries for help in the face of cheap meat imports killing the domestic pork production have been sounding for quite some time... The director-general of Valga Meat Industry [Valga Lihatoostus], however, is not at all sure that the situation has been saved.