On February 18th, EBA participated at the meeting of the Parliament Comission of Economy, Budget and Finance, on the subject of Draft Amendment to the Domestic trade law nr. 231.
EBA strongly reiterated its position on the need to support the local producers.
However, the support should not be offered through a state intervention by creating limitations related to domination of local products on the supermarket shelves, by limiting the number advertisement days and by limiting the percentage of discounts.
Current legal proposals infringe article 152 from AA/DCFTA, and WTO/ GATT article 4.
It was also mentioned that Romania made an attempt to insert certain limitations related to contractual relation between traders and producers, which was not accepted by European Commision.
EBA strongly supports and encourages the Government of Moldova to divide well targeted programs to support the local producers deriving from strategic priorities of the country being focused on concrete types of products, period of the year, thus promoting certain regions etc.
This programs can be also implemented in partership with retails chains.
However these should be a choice and not an obligation given to the both parties.
The meeting was attended by the representatives of BSOs, retail companies (national and international), local producers.