The Chamber of Commerce has noted the Federation of Industry's remarks carried in The Sunday Times (August 11) regarding the dismantling of import levies and its claim that the FOI disagreed with the Chamber's stand, presumably as expressed in the editorial of the July edition of the Commercial Courier.

It is clear that the FOI have, hopefully unintentionally, misinterpreted the Chamber's original comments because nowhere in this editorial, or indeed in any other pronouncement, did the Chamber express itself against Government's position to negotiate transition periods for the agricultural industry and related sectors.

The Chamber called for more equitable market access for Malta's products by the EU and called on the European Union to help the local agricultural sector in a number of other ways, including financially. In doing so it reiterated claims made by the Chamber's president when addressing EU Trade Commissioner Pascal Lamy, who visited the Exchange last May.

The Chamber cannot but be obviously in favour of allowing the local agricultural sector every opportunity to restructure. In fact, its reservations on the subsidies currently being granted to farmers are influenced by a lack of commitment on the part of the recipients towards real restructuring. The Chamber called for a faster pace in liberalisation with regard to those products which are not locally grown and which continue to receive substantial protection. Such items constitute the source of competition distortions within the local market because they are often subject to exemptions from import levies granted to local producers.

Chamber members have often complained that some local operators benefiting from such a treatment are reselling their imports locally with little or no value added on the retail or catering markets to the detriment of other importers whose products carry a prohibitive levy.