India: Temporary facilitation of raw sugar imports
Effective 17 Feburary 2009, the government of India suspended certain criteria for the preferential treatment of raw sugar imports.
The "actual user condition" specified among those conditions necessary to qualify for a preferential (i.e. duty free) treatment of imports shall not be applied for imports of raw sugar from 17 February until 30 September 2009.
Also, the export obligation necessary to apply for imports of raw sugar may also be filled through white sugar exports from 17 February 2009.
The "actual user condition" contains the following requirements (see Notification 93/2004):
- "that the importer produces evidence of discharge of export obligation to the satisfaction of the Deputy Commissioner of Customs or Assistant Commissioner of Customs, as the case may be, within a period of 30 days of the expiry of period allowed for fulfilment of export obligation, or within such extended period as the said Deputy Commissioner of Customs or Assistant Commissioner of Customs, as the case may be, may allow;
- that the said licence and the materials shall not be transferred or sold;
- that in relation to the said licence issued to a merchant exporter,-
- the name and address of the supporting manufacturer is specified in the said licence and the bond required to be executed by the importer in terms of condition (iii) shall be executed jointly by the merchant exporter and the supporting manufacturer binding themselves jointly and severally to comply with the conditions specified in this notification; and
- exempt materials are utilised in the factory of such supporting manufacturer for discharge of export obligation and the same shall not be transferred or sold or used for any other purpose by the said merchant exporter."
Any Evidence-Based Deliberation:
|Is there anything in the public record to suggest that evidence of the effectiveness of the proposed measure was considered during official deliberations?|
|Is there any evidence that alternatives to the proposed measure were considered?|
|Is there anything in the public record that suggests that empirical evidence informed the comparison across the alternatives available to government?|
|Was such evidence identified?|
|Is such evidence publicly available?|
|Did the official decision-maker in question provide an explanation as to why a chosen measure was favoured over alternatives?|
|Is there any evidence to suggest that potentially affected trading partners were consulted before the measures were taken?|
|Is there any evidence that safeguards have been put in place to ensure that implementation of the initiative is transparent and non-discriminatory?|
|Did the government state its intention to review the measure within one year of implementation?|
Date of inception: 17 Feb 2009
GTA Evaluation: Green
India Customs. (2009). Notification 22/2009. Available at http://www.cbec.gov.in/customs/cs-act/notifications/notfns-2k9/cs22-2k9.htm
India Customs. (2004). Notification 93/2004. Available at http://www.cbec.gov.in/customs/cs-act/notifications/notfns-2k4/cs93-2k4.htm