FRANCE: French syrup producer wins export refund case at ECJ

A French food supplier has won a case at the European Court of Justice, establishing the legal principle that EU Member States cannot demand additional evidence from exporters to show that their product has been consumed or used in manufacturing abroad, as a condition of handing over export refunds. Roquette Frères SA had taken legal action against France’s Office National Interprofessionnel des Céréales over a shipment of glucose syrup to Austria, before it joined the EU. It had been used to manufacture penicillin, but was refused payment of FF292,000 because it could not provide the "additional evidence which ONIC had requested...to establish that the glucose had been consumed in the unaltered state on the Austrian market."

December 20, 2000

A French food supplier has won a case at the European Court of Justice, establishing the legal principle that EU Member States cannot demand additional evidence from exporters to show that their product has been consumed or used in manufacturing abroad, as a condition of handing over export refunds. Roquette Frères SA had taken legal action against France’s Office National Interprofessionnel des Céréales over a shipment of glucose syrup to Austria, before it joined the EU. It had been used to manufacture penicillin, but was refused payment of FF292,000 because it could not provide the “additional evidence which ONIC had requested…to establish that the glucose had been consumed in the unaltered state on the Austrian market.”