OREANDA-NEWS.  September 27, 2013. As EU Commissioner for Agriculture and Rural Development Dacian Ciolos briefed to journalists, the resolution to lift quotas on Moldovan wine duty-free deliveries to the EU was adopted within the effective autonomous trade preferences and without waiting until RM-EU DCFTA agreement is initialled.

According to Dacian Ciolos, the resolution is now pending for approval by the EU Council of Ministers and EU Parliament. The EU Commissioner hopes it will not take too long to approve the document. When done, the resolution will enable Moldovan winemakers to import their wine to the EU market without any quantitative and tariff restraints. Earlier, EU Commissioner for Enlargement and European Neighbourhood Policy Stefan Fule stated the EU had taken note of the Russian ban on import of Moldovan wine and noted there had been no visible food-safety-related reasons to explain the ban.

As he said, food safety control agencies of the EU had failed to discover whatever problems of sanitary or hygienic nature in Moldovan wine and the EU had been importing wine and other agricultural products from Moldova. He also promised the EC would consider an opportunity of increasing quotas on Moldovan wine export to the EU.

According to the Economy Ministry, in Q1, 2013, the duty-free export of Moldovan wine to the EU has made up 5.6 million litres. Moldova has drawn down 22.4% of its annual wine quota of 24 million litres. Biggest amounts of the wine were exported to the Czech Republic, Poland, Romania and Slovakia.