Brexit and tariff rate quotas on EU imports: a complex problem

Tariff rate quotas (TRQs) are a means by which non-EU suppliers of agri-food products can be given preferential access to EU markets within a regulated framework of quotas at tariff rates below the Most Favoured Nation rates bound in the GATT. TRQs are common in governing trade in the meat and dairy sectors of the EU, although they apply to a wide range of other agricultural commodity and processed agri-food products. Brexit poses a complex set of problems regarding TRQs in terms of how the respective parties should divide up jointly undertaken commitments within the WTO, since TRQs have been negotiated by the Commission on behalf of all EU Member States. Whilst individual quota allocations can be allocated to specific third country suppliers, individual Member States receive no specific allocation of the global product TRQ either in total, or from any named preferential supplier. The article outlines the nature of TRQs in the meat and dairy sectors of the EU, and how a simple partitioning of existing quotas between the EU-27 and the UK is unlikely to resolve the complex issue of access rights of third countries to both markets. Possible solutions are explored, including the potential need for reciprocal EU-27–UK TRQs post Brexit