MOSCOW, August 8 (RIA Novosti) – European experts will meet in Brussels on August 14 to debate Moscow’s one-year embargo on food exports from countries that sanctioned Russia, Reuters reported Friday.
"In the current context, the most important is to react in a proportionate and rapid way should the situation arise," Reuters quoted EU's Agriculture Commissioner Dacian Ciolos as saying in a statement.
The panel will be made up of experts with expertise in matters of agricultural trade from the bloc’s 28 member states. They will seek to gauge the potential impact of Russia’s food ban. According to Reuters, the European Commission is also going to set up a task force that will consider steps to help out those affected.
On Thursday, Russia imposed a one-year ban on the imports of beef, pork, poultry, fish, seafood, milk, dairy products, as well as fruits and vegetables from the European Union, the United States, Australia, Canada and Norway.
Immediately after the announcement, Lithuania said the union would hold consultations on the issue to discuss how it could compensate for the ensuing losses. Lithuania is believed to be the most vulnerable country targeted by Russia’s agricultural embargo as its exports of the now-banned foods to Russia make up about 2.5 percent of the nation’s GDP.
Vilnius also said it did not rule out that the European Union would bring a case against Russia at the World Trade Organization (WTO), an international trade regulator, to put pressure on Russia to lift the embargo. A WTO source said Friday the organization was unlikely to tackle the ban until its September session.
The United States has already imposed several rounds of sanctions against Russian officials, business people and companies and pressed for its allies in the West to follow its lead. The European Union, Canada, and Australia soon caved in and drew up their own blacklists.
Moscow said it was ready to review the terms of its import restrictions if its Western partners showed a commitment to dialogue.
