1. Introduction

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The pur­pose of this Guide is to pro­vide an over­view of the sys­tem of im­port and ex­port li­cences for agri­cul­tural prod­ucts in the EU and how it is ap­plied in Fin­land. The sys­tem of im­port and ex­port li­cences for agri­cul­tural prod­ucts forms part of the EU’s Com­mon Agri­cul­tural Pol­icy, the pur­pose of which is to at­tain a bal­anced mar­ket sit­u­a­tion.

Im­port and ex­port li­cences are pro­vided for in the fol­low­ing reg­u­la­tions and na­tional leg­is­la­tion:
• Com­mis­sion Del­e­gated Reg­u­la­tion (EU) 2016/1237 of 18 May 2016 sup­ple­ment­ing Reg­u­la­tion (EU) No 1308/2013 of the Eu­ro­pean Par­lia­ment and of the Coun­cil with re­gard to the rules for ap­ply­ing the sys­tem of im­port and ex­port li­cences and sup­ple­ment­ing Reg­u­la­tion (EU) No 1306/2013 of the Eu­ro­pean Par­lia­ment and of the Coun­cil with re­gard to the rules on the re­lease and for­feit of se­cu­ri­ties lodged for such li­cences, amend­ing Com­mis­sion Reg­u­la­tions (EC) No 2535/2001, (EC) No 1342/2003, (EC) No 2336/2003, (EC) No 951/2006, (EC) No 341/2007 and (EC) No 382/2008 and re­peal­ing Com­mis­sion Reg­u­la­tions (EC) No 2390/98, (EC)No 1345/2005, (EC) No 376/2008 and (EC) No 507/2008.

• Com­mis­sion Im­ple­ment­ing Reg­u­la­tion (EU) 2016/1239 of 18 May 2016 lay­ing down rules for the ap­pli­ca­tion of Reg­u­la­tion (EU) No 1308/2013 of the Eu­ro­pean Par­lia­ment and of the Coun­cil with re­gard to the sys­tem of im­port and ex­port li­cences. An­nex II Part I of the Im­ple­ment­ing Reg­u­la­tion lists the agri­cul­tural prod­ucts sub­ject to a li­cens­ing obli­ga­tion for im­ports. An­nex II Part II of the Im­ple­ment­ing Reg­u­la­tion lists the agri­cul­tural prod­ucts sub­ject to a li­cens­ing obli­ga­tion for ex­ports.

• The se­cu­rity sys­tem for agri­cul­tural prod­ucts is pro­vided for in Com­mis­sion Del­e­gated Reg­u­la­tion (EU) No 907/2014 of 11 March 2014 sup­ple­ment­ing Reg­u­la­tion (EU) No 1306/2013 of the Eu­ro­pean Par­lia­ment and of the Coun­cil with re­gard to pay­ing agen­cies and other bod­ies, fi­nan­cial man­age­ment, clear­ance of ac­counts, se­cu­ri­ties and use of euro.

• Act on the Or­gan­i­sa­tion of Mar­kets in Agri­cul­tural Prod­ucts (999/2012).
The afore­men­tioned Com­mis­sion Reg­u­la­tions are di­rectly en­force­able in Fin­land. The guide­lines is­sued are based on these Reg­u­la­tions but are not legally bind­ing. The in­for­ma­tion in this Guide is in­dica­tive only. Since EU leg­is­la­tion is con­stantly be­ing amended, the in­for­ma­tion in this Guide may not be ac­cu­rate, even though the Guide is also reg­u­larly up­dated. Please note that cur­rently valid leg­is­la­tion al­ways takes prece­dence over any guide­lines or in­struc­tions. EU leg­is­la­tion is pub­lished in the Of­fi­cial Jour­nal of the Eu­ro­pean Union, whose web ad­dress is http://www.eu­rlex.eu­ropa.eu When sub­mit­ting an ap­pli­ca­tion, please check the cur­rently valid leg­is­la­tion and pro­ce­dures by con­tact­ing the Mar­ket De­part­ment.

The Mar­ket De­part­ment of the Finnish Food Au­thor­ity, here­inafter the Mar­ket De­part­ment, is the com­pe­tent au­thor­ity for is­su­ing im­port and ex­port li­cences. The Fi­nan­cial Man­age­ment of the Finnish Food Au­thor­ity re­ceives se­cu­ri­ties, re­funds and with­holds se­cu­ri­ties as re­quired, and main­tains a reg­is­ter of se­cu­ri­ties. Con­tact in­for­ma­tion is given in sec­tion 10 at the end of this Guide.

The in­struc­tions given in this Guide mainly con­cern li­cences other than quota im­port and ex­port li­cences. There may be spe­cial pro­vi­sions ap­ply­ing to quota im­port and ex­port li­cences that dif­fer from the gen­eral pro­vi­sions dis­cussed in this Guide. This Guide does not ap­ply to quo­tas ad­min­is­tered through the quota reg­is­ter, re­gard­ing which the com­pe­tent au­thor­ity is the For­eign Trade and Tax­a­tion De­part­ment of Finnish Cus­toms (con­tact in­for­ma­tion given at the end of the Guide). The forms re­ferred to in this Guide are avail­able on­line at the Finnish Food Au­thor­ity web­site, https://www.ruokavi­rasto.fi/en/com­pa­nies/im­port-and-ex­port/im­port/agrim-im­port-li­cences/

1.1. Imports and exports monitoring system

The im­port of cer­tain agri­cul­tural prod­ucts from third coun­tries re­quires an AGRIM im­port li­cence un­der the or­gan­i­sa­tion of agri­cul­tural mar­kets; sim­i­larly, the ex­port of cer­tain agri­cul­tural prod­ucts to third coun­tries re­quires an AGRIM ex­port li­cence. The pur­pose of im­port and ex­port li­cences is to en­sure good ad­min­is­tra­tion of the mar­ket or­gan­i­sa­tion. Im­port and ex­port li­cences are mon­i­tor­ing doc­u­ments. Such li­cences are is­sued to ap­pli­cants who have reg­is­tered as cus­tomers of the Mar­ket De­part­ment and reg­is­tered an EORI num­ber with Cus­toms, who have lodged a se­cu­rity if re­quired, who have filled out their ap­pli­ca­tions ap­pro­pri­ately and in whose case the pro­posed net quan­tity of the agri­cul­tural prod­uct han­dled re­quires a li­cence. Im­port and ex­port li­cences are valid in all Mem­ber States of the Eu­ro­pean Union ex­cept in cer­tain spe­cial cases sep­a­rately pro­vided for in EU leg­is­la­tion.

1.2. Preferential arrangements

In some cases, pref­er­en­tial treat­ment is ap­plied to the im­port of agri­cul­tural prod­ucts from third coun­tries. These are mainly linked to a spe­cific max­i­mum quan­tity, known as a tar­iff quota. Tar­iff quo­tas are a mech­a­nism for grant­ing re­duc­tions on cus­toms du­ties when im­port­ing a prod­uct into the Eu­ro­pean Com­mu­nity. Once the quota for any par­tic­u­lar such prod­uct is filled, im­ports from third coun­tries may con­tinue but will be sub­ject to full im­port du­ties and other levies.

Tar­iff quo­tas may be di­vided into quo­tas based on mul­ti­lat­eral or bi­lat­eral agree­ments on the one hand and quo­tas based on uni­lat­eral ar­range­ments on the other. Agree­ment quo­tas are based on pref­er­en­tial treat­ment agreed be­tween the Eu­ro­pean Union and third coun­tries. Ex­am­ples of this are the quo­tas based on Eu­rope agree­ments, the ACT-EC Agree­ment and the Euro-Mediter­ranean agree­ments. Im­port quo­tas only ap­ply to prod­ucts that have been shown to orig­i­nate in the coun­try con­cerned. WTO (for­merly GATT) quo­tas are also agree­ment-based quo­tas; they con­sti­tute their own group in the tar­iff quota sys­tem. Uni­lat­eral con­ces­sions granted by the Eu­ro­pean Union al­low for par­tial or com­plete ex­emp­tion from im­port du­ties for prod­ucts that are not pro­duced in the Eu­ro­pean Union in suf­fi­cient quan­ti­ties.

Var­i­ous meth­ods are em­ployed in ap­ply­ing for quo­tas and in ap­por­tion­ing quan­ti­ties among ap­pli­cants. Quo­tas on agri­cul­tural prod­ucts are quo­tas that are man­aged ei­ther through an ap­pli­ca­tion pro­ce­dure or with a quota reg­is­ter.