India said it will reduce its import duty on Canadian lentils.
Greg Cherewyk is president of Pulse Canada.
"The Indian Ministry of Finance announced last week that India's import duty on lentils from all origins, except the U.S., would be reduced from 30 per cent to 10 per cent. There's a 10 per cent tax on duty, so the effective rate drops from 33 per cent to 11 per cent."
He talked about what the move means.
"I think the first thing, at a high level, it says to us that this government will intervene when supplies tighten and domestic prices get too high. This is generally a move to increase the domestic supply of lentils to temper food inflation. Food inflation can impact the most vulnerable segments of any population. It's particularly relevant to India. It's not something that would go unchecked very long under any condition."
Cherewyk notes tariffs also remain on chick peas and yellow peas.
"We have tariffs in place for chick peas. We have tariff plus a quantitative restriction in place for yellow peas as well. For some time now, it's been lentils that have been moving, even at that higher rate of 30 per cent. Lentils have been moving quite well into India, particularly this year."
He notes the understanding right now is that reduction applies to cargo cleared through Indian ports by August 31st, 2020.
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