STATE TRADING

REPLY TO QUESTION FROM the european union[1]
REGARDING mauritius' NEW AND FULL NOTIFICATION^[2]

The following communication, dated and received on 19 April 2024, is being circulated at the request of the delegation of Mauritius.

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Question

Could Mauritius provide information on whether the Agricultural Marketing Board was actually involved in exports of any agricultural products? If so, which were the products and quantities?

Reply:

The Agricultural Marketing Board can export goods under specific conditions and upon request.

During the period 2018-2023, the AMB exported seed potatoes on a commercial basis on two occasions:

(i)_   the first export was 550 kg of seed potatoes to Comoros in 2022; and

(ii)_  the second export was equivalent to 526 kg of seed potatoes again to Comoros in 2023.

Both exports were initiated following a request made to the Food and Agricultural Research and Extension Institute of Mauritius (FAREI) by the Centre de Coopération Internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement (CIRAD) of Réunion Island, a territory of France.

CIRAD oversees the Food-Sec Semence project which is part of the regional support program for food and nutritional security in the Indian Ocean region and which is funded by the European Union. The partners involved in the project’s implementation include CIRAD in Réunion Island; FOFIFA in Madagascar; FAREI in Mauritius; the NBA in Seychelles; and the University of Comoros. The project aims at producing, testing and distributing disease-free planting materials of cassava, potatoes, maize and leguminous crops with enhanced nutritional quality.

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