Council Regulation (EC) No 814/2003 of 8 May 2003 amending Regulation (EC) No 2501/2001 applying a scheme of generalised tariff preferences for the period from 1 January 2002 to 31 December 2004

Council Regulation (EC) No 814/2003
of 8 May 2003
amending Regulation (EC) No 2501/2001 applying a scheme of generalised tariff preferences for the period from 1 January 2002 to 31 December 2004
THE COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN UNION
,
Having regard to the Treaty establishing the European Community, and in particular Article 133 thereof,
Having regard to the proposal from the Commission,
Whereas:
(1) Since its entry into force on 1 January 2002, Regulation (EC) No 2501/2001(1) has been found to require certain amendments.
(2) In particular, a specific provision should be introduced in order to allow any beneficiary country which would face a grave economic and financial crisis to be exempted from the graduation of new sectors. Furthermore, since the provisions of Regulation (EC) No 2501/2001 referring to sectors cannot apply to products to which no specific sector has been assigned, Annex III to the said Regulation should be amended so as to specify a sector for every product covered by any of the different arrangements.
(3) It proved impossible to adopt the first decision envisaged in Article 12(5) of the abovementioned Regulation before 1 January 2003; it is therefore appropriate to provide that the removal of tariff preferences should apply, in two stages, from 1 November 2003 and 1 May 2004.
(4) Regulation (EC) No 2501/2001 should therefore be amended accordingly,