The Association of European Banana Producers (APEB) claimed on Monday that the European Commission is looking to lower the EU’s banana import tariff from €176 a tonne to €120/t.

The news has angered APEB members who say that the lowering of the tariff would not take into account Spain’s application to the Commission that bananas be treated as a sensitive product. The organisation’s president Leopoldo Cólogan said such a move would be “absolutely unjust” and referred to the Madeira agreement signed by the farm ministers of Spain, France, Portugal and Cyprus for a safeguard clause should the tariff fall substantially below the €176/t level. Such a drastic lowering of the tariff also appears to fly in the face of the EU’s external relations council that has only recently agreed to leave discussion on a safeguard clause open.

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