This is according to a document from the World Trade Organisation (WTO), providing the latest blow to Brussels and a sign of how global trade powers are intensifying demands over the UK’s imminent exit from the bloc should be managed – both short and long-term. It also marks yet another hurdle in the plan from the European Union and Britain to untangle their WTO commitments post-Brexit, increasing the likelihood of a huge showdown at the global trade body. The document, obtained by Bloomberg and discussed at a WTO meeting in Geneva on Monday, was signed by Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, Mexico, New Zealand, Paraguay, Taiwan, Thailand, the US and Uruguay.
It said: “We urge the EU to provide further assurances to members that it will provide clarity on how it intends to account for UK-EU trade; that it will provide for negotiated outcomes that maintain the quality and level of access currently enjoyed to the EU; and that appropriate compensation will be offered where this access is not maintained.
“Given their considerable, unprecedented scale and scope, these changes are of general and systemic interest to the WTO membership.”
The 12 countries are furious with how the EU plans to split sensitive import quotas with Britain when it leaves the bloc in March 2019.
According to the document, the nations said Brussels has not made any new WTO commitments regarding the future trading relationship between itself and the UK.
Tariff-rate quotas (TRQs) define the volume of sensitive goods, such as meat and cheese, that other World Trade Organisation (WTO) members can export to Europe.
They set the amounts of goods that can be imported at low or zero tariffs, as opposed to full WTO rates that can often exceed 100 percent.
Last year, Brussels and London came up with a joint plan that involved dividing the current quotas based on consumption patterns.
This means the UK would take a larger quota for products such as New Zealand lamb, for example, where it accounts for much of the European Union demand.
Both the EU and Britain have been working together over recent months around how to share out the TRQs, which are particularly valuable to agricultural exporters such as Argentina and New Zealand, and also the powerful farm lobby in the US.
It is also a hugely important issue for Brussels and London, as the result of talks will determine how much competition farmers from within the EU and specifically the UK will face.
But failure to find a solution at the WTO over how to split the TRQs could even trigger legal challenges from several of the EU’s trading partners.
In a further blow, negotiations on the general market access the UK will provide other WTO members and on the UK’s membership of an international agreement on public procurement are reportedly progressing slower than anticipated.