The Brexit Arms

[BrexitArmsLandlady]

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Ever closer to Brexit! 🥂 🍻 🍾

Remainers are welcome, as ever.

But!

If you just want to abuse Brexiteers, then start your own thread.

This is a pub thread, not an interrogate-a-Brexiteer thread

We have more in common etc, even if Brexit divides us.

A week is a long time in politics...the 10 years could mean more decide we were right.

You're right bearbehind - the changing logic is illogical priceless.

Talk about nailing jelly to a wall.

Or is it Shrödinger's Refugee Crisis? At once the EU's fault for not doing enough and simultaneously a global crisis that is impossible to solve

I said problem... you said impossible to solve......
If you are a member you are one till you leave...... or are you saying the EU ... the land of fairness have double standards.....
So nice you can see that point and conceed it to me....

I think the refugee crisis has hit some parts of the EU more than others. Like Italy and Greece where many feel they are not being helped enough by the rest of the EU.

Many of the refugees landing in these countries are young men from sub Saharan Africa and not just people from war torn middle eastern regions.

I feel we have an opportunity to help many countries in those areas improve their economy and improve the lives of their populations after Brexit as we can trade with them and invest in them so they can better help themselves.

I feel we have an opportunity to help many countries in those areas improve their economy and improve the lives of their populations after Brexit as we can trade with them and invest in them so they can better help themselves.

Which presumably is completely impossible today :D

• so London your admitting the EU isn't doing this...

I don't think mummy2017 gets sarcasm LondonMum

It's beyond belief.

That's rich.....such a shame you write something and the interpretation isn't the one you want us to use......
But there again that's normal here people read lots of things never written and apply it to statements to create a cherry picked ststement...
Could that be why we are where we are now....project fear springs to mind.

Londonmum - Africa imports over 80% of it's food and is dissuaded by such things as EU tariffs to process their own products. For instance they are encouraged to export only raw materials rather than being able to add value to them by processing them themselves.
The EU intentionally persists in this 'colonial' type of protectionism which does little to help people in other parts of the world.

@double Sorry, but that doesn't make much sense.
If Africa imports over 80% of its food, why is BFJ telling us we can import food cheaply from Africa? Surely they haven't got enough for themselves!
Any reasonable references to support any parts of your statement above at all?

Africa imports over 80% of it's food

Do you have a reference for that figure?

Ah, found it here I think: www.dpa-international.com/topic/urn:newsml:dpa.com:20090101:170503-99-298260/amp

African countries have been made to export their produce as raw materials like cocoa. It is exported to the likes of the EU where it is processed. If there were to process it themselves the EU charges them a 30% tariff for the finished product i.e. chocolate thus protecting the Belgium and other chocolate makers.

@Doubletrouble99 Sounds like UKIP propaganda, particularly in absence of the requested references. The key point stands - they don't have enough food to feed themselves if they've got to import 80% of it.

The African continent has 1.2 billion people on it. Seems like enough people to create their own cocoa processing for internal markets.

The myths about the nasty protectionist EU damaging developing countries has long been peddled by our beloved right wing press.

Below is a clarification to an article which claimed that the EU apply tariffs to processed coffee and not raw beans - okay, not cocoa, but the principle (and tariffs) are the same under the Everything But Arms initiative.

A clarification from Philippe Legrain:

Calestous Juma claims that the EU harms African coffee roasters by allowing in imports of “non-decaffeinated green coffee” duty-free while charging a 7.5 per cent tariff on roasted coffee. This is incorrect.

The EU does charge a 7.5 per cent tariff on imports of roasted coffee from countries to which it does not offer preferential terms. But under its Everything But Arms (EBA) initiative for least-developed countries, almost all African coffee-producing countries can export roasted coffee to the EU tariff-free. Under the Generalised System of Preferences (GSP) for other poor countries, the EU tariff on roasted coffee from Nigeria and the Republic of Congo is a reduced rate of 2.6 per cent. Far from discriminating against African coffee roasters, the EU gives them privileged access to its market.

Only Gabon, which the World Bank now classifies as an upper-middle income country, is not eligible for either the EBA or GSP preferential rate. And the EU is seeking to negotiate an Economic Partnership Agreement with it and other Central African countries that could offer it preferential terms too.

African farmers benefit from being able to export raw coffee to the EU. While Africa would benefit even more if more coffee was roasted there before export, the EU is not to blame for the fact that it isn’t. Since roasted coffee has a short shelf life, the continent’s poor roads and ports are big impediments. Intermittent electricity and water supplies and high energy costs also make roasting problematic.

Don’t believe everything you hear/read. Dig a little deeper.

London did you read what it said..the EU are subsidies to their own members mean it's cheaper to sell raw goods and buy back once processed than to do the job in Africa .......

Mummmy, did you read my post. It is a myth.

Apologies mummmy, just realised you were making a different point.

I know Trees, our industry has dropped for the same reason, cheaper to buy in than to make.
In a way the tariffs might mean people do now decide to invest in industry once more.

Yes mummy I've read and found no basis in fact. Looking at the trade stats, EU runs a massive food trade deficit with Africa, main exports there include wheat, baby products and meat, i. e. a lot of raw products. Sounds like another one of BFJ's non-issue brainwashers, alongside banana curvature.

I was talking Cocoa not coffee talks. I know that the tariffs have changed for coffee but not for cocoa which is 30%.

Double, the clue is in the name - “Everything But Arms”.

trade.ec.europa.eu/tradehelp/everything-arms