Turkey's trade minister said on Wednesday his country would abolish rice quotas from July 31 in a move aimed at resolving a dispute with the United States over access to Turkey's $200 million rice market.
"We will abolish the quota. I submitted a letter to (US Trade Representative) Rob Portman. This rice issue is already solved," Turkish State Minister for Foreign Trade Kursad Tuzmen told Reuters after meeting representatives of the US textile industry.
The United States asked the World Trade Organisation in February to establish a panel to hear its complaint about Ankara's rice import licensing system, which it blames for a two-thirds decline in US rice exports to Turkey since 2003.
The US complaint focuses on what it says are Turkish requirements that importers first buy large quantities of rice in Turkey before they can be granted a licence to import rice from other countries.
A spokeswoman for the US Trade Representative's office said on Monday they had just received a proposal from Turkey for resolving the spat and were still studying it.
Comments
Comments are closed.