New customs regulations: These Brexit hurdles hit companies hard

Saturday, January 23, 2021

New customs regulations
These Brexit hurdles hit companies hard

By Charlotte Raskopf

Since Great Britain is no longer a member of the EU internal market, additional tariffs and a lot of bureaucracy are due. Scottish fishermen, whose deliveries were stuck in traffic for days, have already felt this. Tons of fish and seafood were rotting. Which industries are still suffering.

In the last few weeks it has become quiet around Brexit. What came into force at the beginning of this year was what negotiators had been working towards since the referendum on leaving the EU in Great Britain in 2016: the Brexit deal is in place and Great Britain has left the internal market and the EU customs union. But even if the Brexit deal prevented the great chaos, the new rules hit some industries hard. An overview:

Fisheries: disappointed hopes

They vent their anger: numerous British fishermen demonstrated on Monday against the high bureaucratic hurdles that have been in place for the export of their goods to the EU since the end of the transition phase of Brexit. They positioned themselves with a number of trucks in London's government district. You are disappointed. Many fishermen voted to leave the EU – the demands to regain control of their own territorial waters were central to the pro-Brexit campaign. And so it was the fishing rights that threatened at the last minute to let the Brexit agreement fail.

In the end there was an agreement. For the fishermen, however, this does not mean the freedom they had hoped for, but rather anger. The bureaucracy complicates and delays deliveries to the EU. Mark Simmonds, Director of Policy for the British Ports Association, laments: "The problems that are looming with fisheries exporters are a disaster for the fishing sector and the coastal communities that depend on it and must be addressed immediately." Fewer ships would land in Great Britain and prices would collapse. "Our concern is that in the long run these problems will become normal and permanently undermine the competitiveness of UK fishing ports," says Simmonds.

The Scottish Fishermen's Federation denounced something similar in a letter to the British Prime Minister. Some fishing boats would drive a 72-hour circular route across Denmark, they say. This is the only way they can guarantee that their catch can be sold at a fair price and that it reaches consumers fresh. The Scottish Fishermen's Federation complains that the deal that has been made is not what Johnson promised the fishermen.

In a video, a Scottish fisherman also speaks about the problems. You can no longer get a product on the European market, he says. "The Westminster government ridiculed us."

Logistics: missing papers

The bureaucracy at the border not only affects the fishermen, logistics companies also have to struggle with the extensive forms. DB Schenker recently announced that it will temporarily no longer accept any new shipments that are to be sent from the EU to Great Britain. The reason: only ten percent of the consignments ordered are provided with complete and correct papers. "In the majority of the shipments, however, there are deficiencies in the documents," it says.

DPD announced shortly before Christmas that it would suspend parcel intelligence to and from Great Britain until further notice. Parcels could still be sent to Ireland, but this was no longer possible from Ireland to the EU. According to the company, the reason for these restrictions was not Brexit, but the coronavirus mutation, which is spreading massively in Great Britain.

Supermarkets: empty shelves?

Empty supermarket shelves due to Brexit regulations in the UK are among the biggest Brexit-related fears. In a letter to British Cabinet Secretary Micheal Gove, the heads of large retail chains such as Tesco, Sainsbury's, Asda and Marks & Spencer fuel such fears. According to the Reuters news agency, they are warning of delivery bottlenecks because a grace period currently in force, which allows simplified controls for food deliveries to Northern Ireland, ends on March 31.

Northern Ireland is part of Great Britain, but has continued to be treated as part of the EU customs union and the internal market since Brexit came into force. This is to avoid a hard border between Northern Ireland and Ireland. When the transition period expires, there could indeed be empty supermarket shelves in Northern Ireland. To prevent this, according to Reuters, the retail chain bosses are calling for an early long-term solution with the EU and help in overcoming the bureaucratic hurdles associated with the new controls.

Chemical industry: complicated trade

The UK chemical industry is also suffering from the new rules on trade with the EU. For example, Aston Chemicals, a distributor of various specialty chemicals based in Aylesbury, UK, had to restructure its logistics in order to continue serving the European market reliably. Aston Chemicals imports from abroad and then exported from Great Britain to the EU.

However, the new rules complicate this process. The company decided to supply customers from the EU from Poland in the future. The workforce at the UK site is said to have been reduced accordingly.

This article first appeared on Capital.de.