Flying fish, frozen fish and beer are among several items from T&T that will now be subject to monitoring licences by the Barbados Government, adding to the tensions created by an already-heated fishing dispute...
News Source: Trinidad Guardian
Prime Minister Owen Arthur announced the measures yesterday in a press conference carried live on Barbadian radio and television from Government headquarters in Bridgetown.
Arthur said the list of T&T goods subject to the sanctions would be provided for the Barbadian public tomorrow.
Barbados media reports said Arthur?s announcements came a few hours after he said he received an early morning telephone call from Prime Minister Patrick Manning.
The reports said Manning and Arthur proposed that they meet on Tuesday to restart stalled fishing talks.
On Friday, the Guardian exclusively reported that a heavy duty on T&T goods was being considered when Arthur held his weekly meeting with his Cabinet on Thursday.
Last night, Trinidad & Tobago Television reported that Arthur said Barbados? Ministry of Consumer Affairs decided that ?a wider range of goods, especially those products which compete with local products, should be placed on import licence, so that their level of imports could be more closely-monitored.?
One Barbados media report said that country?s Minister of Commerce, Lynette Eastmond, signed on Friday an order which set out a list of items to be placed under import licence.
Arthur said yesterday that under the revised Treaty of Chaguaramas, states participating in the Single Market and Economy (CSME) had a right to introduce import restrictions where it was clear that their domestic production suffered, or faced such a threat, from other CSME participants.
On Monday, Arthur issued a trade threat against T&T goods after he held an emergency Cabinet meeting, in response to the arrest of two Barbadian fishermen who were charged with fishing illegally in T&T waters.
FOLLOWING is a list of some of the goods now under Barbados monitoring licence, as reported by the Barbados media:
Flying fish, frozen fish, fillet, other fish meat
(fresh or chilled), shark, biscuits, wafers, cucumbers, pumpkins, melons, tomatoes, cabbage, a range of vegetables (frozen or fresh), ketchup, ice cream, aerated beverages, beer, stout, doors and their frames and thresholds, paper or paper board labels, bars and rods of iron of non-alloyed steel and Tee shirts.
