BRUSSELS, July 1. /TASS/. The EU prohibitive tariffs on grain from Russia and Belarus have come into effect. According to the May 30 European Council decree, tariffs on grain import from Russia and Belarus have been raised significantly, reaching 50% of market price for certain grains.
Russia has not been seriously affected by these actions. According to head of the Federal Service for Veterinary and Phytosanitary Supervision of Russia Sergey Dankvert, this decision will harm European food and port industries, while Russia will be able to easily diversify its markets.
The European Council claims that the goal of European tariffs is to stop the destabilization of European markets by Russian grain and to attempt to decrease Russia’s agricultural income. In reality, though, these measures aim to free at least a small share of the European market for import of grain from Ukraine, which has already led to overstocking and farmers’ protests in Europe.
The Council announced that the tariffs do not cover the transit of grain to third countries through European ports.
The European Commission proposed to introduce "prohibitively high" grain fees on March 22. Back then, Vice President of the European Commission Valdis Dombrovskis said that this is a de-facto ban on import of grain, sunflower seed and fodder crops from Russia and Belarus, achieved via imposition of tariffs so high that they would make their import to the EU economical unprofitable.
According to Dankvert, this may automatically cause a loss of port capacity for the EU.
"They have lost capacities on fertilizer, and they will lose port capacities on grain as well," Dankvert said.
"We have no fear. As for the markets - we have always been open to diversification of markets, both during import and export. We work efficiently on other directions completely freely. And, right now, we benefit from the market diversification that they have made us do," the official said.