New Delhi, Jun 13 (KNN)  The European Commission last month launched an Export Helpdesk which is a free online, one-stop-shop which would inform businesses in developing countries on how to export to the European Union.

“With just a few clicks, businesses can find the EU requirements, taxes, tariffs, preferential arrangements, rules of origin and statistics applying to their case,” said a notification.
Originally created in 2004, the revised, resourceful and user friendly version of the Helpdesk demonstrates EU’s commitment to facilitate trade with developing countries.

Should an exporter wish to enter the European market, the Helpdesk would provide a full list of requirements, calculating import tariff which apply to specific products and if preferential tariff applies.

The site also provides a list of EU trade contacts and facilitates market research by furnishing detailed statistics on EU trade flows for every product.

In addition, it explains the preferential trade agreements applying to individual cases, and describes how to prove that they satisfy rules of origin.

With a population of over 500 million that account for seven per cent of the world population, the EU is a huge market with enormous potential.  Significantly it has one set of trade rules that apply to all the 27, soon to be 28 member countries.

Moreover, import tariffs are considerably lower and developing countries can have excellent market access with lower tariffs.  About 70 per cent of EU’s agricultural imports come from developing countries.  (KNN)