EU's €2 handling charge for cheap imports to snare Chinese products

euronews (in English)

EU's €2 handling charge for cheap imports to snare Chinese products  Trade Commissioner Maroš Šefčovič announced a fee to counterbalance the cost safety checks for products coming from China – and hopefully curbing numbers of packages sent to Europe.   READ MORE : http://www.euronews.com/2025/05/23/eus-2-handling-charge-for-cheap-imports-to-snare-chinese-products  Subscribe to our channel. Euronews is available on Dailymotion in 12 languages

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00:00The European Union is considering imposing a €2 handling fee for small packages from outside the EU.

00:13The idea is to tackle the tsunami of low-cost products coming from online platforms.

00:19This was revealed by the Trade Commissioner Mara Sevkovic while speaking to the European Parliament.

00:25At the moment, it's a proposal that will need time to get final approval.

00:29Consumer organizations are already concerned that the cost will fall on consumers.

00:34Because these big platforms, their business model is to have very cheap costs,

00:38we can anticipate that they will absorb themselves the costs and that it might not be passed on to consumers.

00:43But ultimately, this will be a business decision.

00:46And again, consumers should not be the one paying the price for the compliance.

00:51Europe receives around 12 million small packages per day, with an estimated 4.6 billion items annually.

00:58Most of them goods sold by online Chinese platforms such as Xi'an and Timu.

01:04But the measure could also apply to other companies such as eBay and Amazon.

01:09Brussels is also concerned about the increasing number of dangerous products that are not respecting European standards.

01:17Experts say more measures are needed to ensure consumer safety.

01:23Most of these products are not compliant with product safety rules of the European Union.

01:28So, for instance, phone chargers that can take fire, smoke detectors not detecting smoke.

01:34And more seriously also, you have, for example, toys with little pieces that can detach and actually cause injuries in small children.

01:42So we have a serious problem and it needs to be tackled.

01:45This could be part of the solution to have this levy and we still need to assess what would be the impact on consumer prices, of course.

01:54The money raised through this handling fee will go into the European budget if approved.

02:01That's all good from that.

02:02With an open

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