FOREIGN Minister K D Knight said yesterday that a proposed tariff of euro187 per tonne on third world countries banana imports into the European market, with a zero-duty quota of 775,000 tonnes for African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) exporters, would have a negative effect on Jamaica and other ACP states.

At the same time, he said there has been no indication how the 775,000-tonne quota would be apportioned among the ACP member states.

“The ACP member states have consistently conveyed the importance of the banana industry to the economic and social development of our respective countries. We have always been mindful that changes in past preferential arrangements are unavoidable. However, the EC’s decision threatens the viability of the banana industry in Jamaica,” Knight said in a statement yesterday.

“Given the significant contribution of banana exports to Jamaica’s socio-economic development, and considering that the sugar industry also faces similar difficulties, this latest proposal could severely compromise Jamaica’s ability to attain our Millennium Development Goals, including a substantial reduction in poverty by the year 2015,” Knight said.

He urged the European Commission to reconsider the proposal, in keeping with its members’ long-standing commitment to support developing countries’ efforts to fulfil their development goals.

This new EC proposal, which would come into effect January 1, 2006, would set the rate well below the euro275 level proposed by the ACP and also below the euro230 figure put forward by the EC in January of this year.

“A euro187 tariff will have a devastating effect on all ACP producers, and could effectively force many producers out of the market completely,” Knight said. Due consideration, he said, must be given to the loss of livelihood for thousands of small farmers, their families and others who depend on the industry.