The Department of Agriculture (DA) aims to impose additional tariffs on certain meat products and chicken curry to protect the Philippine agriculture sector.
Through Department Order No. 24, the agency requests the Bureau of Customs commissioner, via the Department of Finance secretary, to levy volume-based special safeguard (SSG) duties on these farm products.
The agriculture secretary, empowered by the Safeguard Measures Act, can impose SSG duties on various imported agricultural goods when import prices or volumes exceed set thresholds, bypassing the need for a formal investigation. This safeguard measure seeks to shield local industries and producers from increased imports that could cause serious injury.
The DA’s Trade Remedies Office has monitored that actual import volumes of certain agricultural products have surpassed their respective trigger volume thresholds, necessitating the imposition of SSG duties. According to the DA’s order, these volume-based SSG duties will remain effective until the end of the year they are imposed unless reduced or terminated earlier in line with legal regulations.
The Bureau of Customs (BOC) is responsible for computing and enforcing the corresponding SSG duty per applicable legal provisions.
The SSG will apply to meat of bovine animals, boneless, fresh or chilled, and chicken curry in airtight containers for retail sale. It also covers prepared and preserved meat of swine, hams and cuts, meat offal, blood of swine, and luncheon meat not packaged in airtight containers for retail sale.
The measure includes additional prepared and preserved meat, meat offal, blood of swine, hams and cuts, excluding shoulders and their cuts, along with luncheon meat packaged in airtight containers for retail sale.
The Philippine government enforces SSG duties when import volumes or prices breach established trigger levels, consistent with the country’s obligations under the World Trade Organization (WTO) Agreement on Agriculture. (Jordeene B. Lagare © Philippine Daily Inquirer)
