Banana sanctions

[admason]

Have the US banana sanctions been lifted yet?

[Sander]

Yes, the US has formally lifted the trade sanctions it imposed on the EU two years ago in a dispute over EU banana imports.
Europe was buying bananas only from the West Indies and not from US distributors selling fruit produced in Latin America. Now it has agreed to gradually increase its quotas for bananas grown in Latin America until 2006, when all preferential quotas will be eliminated.
The US sanctions put 100% tariffs on a wide range of European goods, including bedlinen, handbags, wallets, bath products, batteries and coffee makers, which effectively doubled their price in the US. The French were hit particularly hard - their exports accounted for a third of the sanctions.