5. Import licence and export licence

Un­der Ar­ti­cle 1 of Com­mis­sion Del­e­gated Reg­u­la­tion (EU) No 2016/1237, an im­port or ex­port li­cence is an elec­tronic or pa­per doc­u­ment with a spe­cific pe­riod of va­lid­ity, ex­press­ing the right and the obli­ga­tion to im­port or ex­port prod­ucts. Im­port and ex­port li­cences are re­ferred to as AGRIM im­port li­cences and AGREX ex­port li­cences, re­spec­tively. Li­cences are valu­able doc­u­ments that must be stored with care.

Com­mis­sion Im­ple­men­ta­tion Reg­u­la­tion (EU) 2016/1239 and Com­mis­sion Del­e­gated Reg­u­la­tion (EU) 2016/1237 list the agri­cul­tural prod­ucts for which and the cases in which an AGRIM im­port li­cence or an AGREX ex­port li­cence is re­quired. The agri­cul­tural prod­ucts in ques­tion are also listed in this Guide, in An­nex I for im­port li­cences and in An­nex II for ex­port li­cences.

5.1. Cases in which an import licence is required

An im­port li­cence must be pre­sented re­gard­ing the fol­low­ing prod­ucts:

• Prod­ucts listed in An­nex I of this Guide when they are de­clared for re­lease for free cir­cu­la­tion un­der any cri­te­ria, ex­cept for tar­iff quo­tas, un­less oth­er­wise stated in An­nex I. An im­port li­cence is only re­quired if the prod­uct quan­ti­ties ex­ceed the net quan­ti­ties listed in An­nex I.

• Prod­ucts de­clared for re­lease for free cir­cu­la­tion un­der a tar­iff quota ad­min­is­tered un­der the ‘si­mul­ta­ne­ous ex­am­i­na­tion method’ or the ‘tra­di­tional/new­com­ers method’ re­ferred to in Ar­ti­cle 184(2)(b) and Ar­ti­cle 184(2)(c), re­spec­tively, of Reg­u­la­tion (EU) No 1308/2013, or a com­bi­na­tion of these meth­ods, or some other fea­si­ble method.

• Prod­ucts listed in An­nex I when de­clared for re­lease for free cir­cu­la­tion un­der a tar­iff quota ad­min­is­tered un­der the ‘first come, first served prin­ci­ple’ re­ferred to in Ar­ti­cle 184(2)(a) of Reg­u­la­tion (EU) No 1308/2013.

• Prod­ucts re­ferred to in An­nex I when de­clared for re­lease for free cir­cu­la­tion un­der pref­er­en­tial treat­ment in­tended to be ad­min­is­tered with li­cences.

• Prod­ucts cov­ered by out­ward pro­cess­ing ar­range­ments us­ing the ex­port li­cence and re­turn­ing for re­lease for free cir­cu­la­tion as a prod­uct listed in An­nex I part A or B.

• Prod­ucts de­clared for re­lease for free cir­cu­la­tion pur­suant to Ar­ti­cle 185 of Reg­u­la­tion (EU) No 1308/2013 if a re­duc­tion in im­port duty is ap­plied.

5.2. Cases in which an export licence is required

• Prod­ucts listed in An­nex II of this Guide (a li­cence is re­quired if the prod­uct quan­ti­ties ex­ceed the net quan­ti­ties listed in An­nex II)

• Union prod­ucts for which an ex­port li­cence needs to be pre­sented for ad­mis­sion un­der a quota that is ad­min­is­tered by the Union or by a third coun­try and has been opened in that coun­try for those prod­ucts

• The fol­low­ing Union prod­ucts re­ferred to in An­nex II to be ex­ported:
– prod­ucts that are un­der the cus­toms pro­ce­dure of in­ward pro­cess­ing

– prod­ucts that are ba­sic prod­ucts as listed in An­nex III to Reg­u­la­tion (EU) No 510/2014 of the Eu­ro­pean Par­lia­ment and of the Coun­cil and that are un­der the cus­toms pro­ce­dure of out­ward pro­cess­ing

– prod­ucts that are sub­ject to the re­cov­ery or re­mis­sion of the amount of im­port or ex­port duty as set out in Chap­ter 3 of Ti­tle III of Reg­u­la­tion (EU) No 952/2013 of the Eu­ro­pean Par­lia­ment and of the Coun­cil in re­spect of which a fi­nal de­ci­sion has not yet been taken

5.3. Applying for an import or export licence

Cus­tomers may ap­ply for an im­port or ex­port li­cence on­line through the Elec­tronic im­port and ex­port li­cence ser­vice² once they have reg­is­tered with the cus­tomer reg­is­ter of the Mar­ket De­part­ment and with the Elec­tronic im­port and ex­port li­cence ser­vice. The Finnish Food Au­thor­ity will send reg­is­tered cus­tomers user IDs for the Elec­tronic im­port and ex­port li­cence ser­vice by e-mail.
^{2 https://todis­tus.ruokavi­rasto.fi/}

In the Elec­tronic im­port and ex­port li­cence ser­vice, cus­tomers may ap­ply for both an elec­tronic li­cence and a pa­per li­cence for use else­where in the EU, if the prod­ucts are to clear cus­toms in an­other Mem­ber State. If the Elec­tronic im­port and ex­port li­cence ser­vice is not avail­able be­cause of tech­ni­cal prob­lems, the AGRIM im­port and AGREX ex­port li­cence ap­pli­ca­tion forms on pa­per may be used. Pa­per ap­pli­ca­tions may be scanned and sent by e-mail to tuovi(at)ruokavi­rasto.fi, or mailed to the Finnish Food Au­thor­ity, PO Box 100, FI-00027 FINNISH FOOD AU­THOR­ITY, or de­liv­ered in per­son to reg­istry of­fice of the Finnish Food Au­thor­ity .

Ap­pli­ca­tions that ar­rive af­ter 14.00 on a work­ing day, or on a Sat­ur­day, Sun­day or pub­lic hol­i­day, are con­sid­ered to have been re­ceived on the work­ing day im­me­di­ately fol­low­ing the day of ar­rival.

A se­cu­rity is re­quired for an im­port or ex­port li­cence. For fur­ther in­for­ma­tion, see ‘Lodg­ing a se­cu­rity’, sec­tion 4.1.

If an ap­pli­ca­tion or any part of it is re­jected, the Finnish Food Au­thor­ity will im­me­di­ately re­lease the se­cu­rity lodged.

5.4. Is­sue of an im­port or ex­port li­cence
Elec­tronic li­cences is­sued will be posted on the Li­cences tab in the Elec­tronic im­port and ex­port li­cence ser­vice. A li­cence may be is­sued as a pa­per doc­u­ment if it is to be used else­where in the EU. Im­port and ex­port li­cences is­sued as pa­per doc­u­ments will be is­sued on AGRIM and AGREX forms, re­spec­tively, and mailed to the ad­dress given by the ap­pli­cant. The pe­ri­ods of va­lid­ity of im­port and ex­port li­cences are given in An­nex II to Com­mis­sion Im­ple­men­ta­tion Reg­u­la­tion 2016/1239 (and An­nexes I and II of this Guide).

En­tries on li­cences and ex­tracts thereof must not be al­tered once is­sued. If the au­thor­ity that is­sued the li­cence con­sid­ers that the li­cence must be cor­rected, the li­cence or ex­tract must first be can­celled, and a cor­rected li­cence or ex­tract is­sued im­me­di­ately.

5.5. Using an import or export licence

An im­port or ex­port li­cence con­fers the right and im­poses an obli­ga­tion to re­lease for free cir­cu­la­tion or to ex­port, re­spec­tively, the quan­tity of prod­ucts spec­i­fied in the li­cence dur­ing the pe­riod of va­lid­ity of the li­cence. The cus­toms dec­la­ra­tion must be filed by the tit­u­lar holder or trans­feree, or a cus­toms rep­re­sen­ta­tive act­ing on their be­half. As per Ar­ti­cle 18 of Reg­u­la­tion (EU) No 952/2013, the cus­toms dec­la­ra­tion must state that the tit­u­lar holder or trans­feree is the party on be­half of which the dec­la­ra­tion is be­ing filed. In such cases, the EORI num­ber of the tit­u­lar holder or trans­feree must be en­tered in the cus­toms dec­la­ra­tion.

If spe­cial EU leg­is­la­tion so re­quires, the obli­ga­tion to re­lease prod­ucts for free cir­cu­la­tion or to ex­port prod­ucts may in­clude an obli­ga­tion to re­lease prod­ucts from or to ex­port to a spe­cific coun­try or group of coun­tries as spec­i­fied in the li­cence.

For elec­tronic im­port/ex­port li­cences used in Fin­land, the tit­u­lar holder must en­ter a reser­va­tion for use of a spe­cific amount in the li­cence in the Elec­tronic im­port and ex­port li­cence ser­vice, which will then be con­firmed by Cus­toms. For en­tries made on pa­per li­cences used else­where in the EU, the cur­rent pro­ce­dures of the cus­toms au­thor­ity in the Mem­ber State in ques­tion as to the dec­la­ra­tion of quan­ti­ties of prod­ucts re­leased for free cir­cu­la­tion or ex­ported should be checked. For pa­per li­cences, the num­ber of the li­cence must be en­tered on the cus­toms dec­la­ra­tion. If the space re­served for en­dorse­ments on the re­verse of the li­cence is not enough, the cus­toms au­thor­ity may ap­pend ex­tra pages to the li­cence.
The quan­tity of prod­ucts im­ported on an im­port li­cence or ex­ported on an ex­port li­cence may dif­fer from the quan­tity spec­i­fied in the li­cence by +/-5%.