Vietnamese footwear exports to the European Union will enjoy its Generalised Scheme of Preferences (GSP) as of January 2014 as they are no longer included in the bloc’s graduation list.

According to the European Market Department under the Ministry of Industry and Trade, the European Commission recently promulgated Regulation No. 1213/2012 on suspending the tariff preferences for a number of GSP beneficiary countries in respect of certain GSP sections.

As a result, Vietnamese footwear products of Sections 12a and 12b were removed from the suspended list.

Under the new mechanism, the tariff preferences of the general arrangement of the GSP are to be suspended in respect of products of a GSP section originating in a GSP beneficiary country when the average value of union imports of such products over three consecutive years from that country exceeds 17.5 percent of total imports of the same product from all other GSP beneficiary countries.-VNA