. /.RESTRICTEDWORLD TRADE
ORGANIZATIONG/SG/Q2/ARG/7
10 January 2001
(01-0090)
Committee on Safeguards Original:  Spanish
NOTIFICATION UNDER ARTICLE 12.1(A) OF THE AGREEMENT ON
SAFEGUARDS ON INITIATION OF AN INVESTIGATION
AND THE REASON FOR IT
Replies to Questions Posed by the United States1
to Argentina2
The following communication, dated 18 December 2000, has been received from the
Permanent Mission of Argentina.
_______________
As regards the rate of duty applied, the MERCOSUR Common External Tariff rate for the
product concerned is 23 per cent.  It should be noted that, pursuant to Resolution No. 942/98 of the
ex-Ministry of Economy and Public Works and Services, the Common External Tariff was raised by
3 percentage points until 31 December 2000 in order to bring it into line with MERCOSUR CouncilDecision No. 15 of 15 December 1997.  The statistical tax applicable to the product is 0.5 per cent.
In accordance with Schedule LXIV, Part I, Section II, the bound tariff is 35 per cent.  It
should be pointed out that this binding at the 35 per cent rate will come into force on 1 January 2003.
The import statistics for the product in question are attached.
                                                     
1 G/SG/Q2/ARG/6
2 G/SG/N/6/ARG/3 + Suppl.1G/SG/Q2/ARG/7
Page 2
Argentine Imports of Motor Cycles of up to 100 Cylinder Capacity
(a) Units
Year MERCOSUR Non-MERCOSUR Total
1995 243 47,040 47,283
1996 41 36,656 36,697
1997 14 51,763 51,777
1998 3,606 68,500 72,106
Variation 96/95 -83% -22% -22%
Variation 97/96 -66% 41% 41%
Variation 98/97 25,657% 32% 39%
(b) Dollars f.o.b.
Year MERCOSUR Non-MERCOSUR Total
1995 194,909 26,700,734 26,895,643
1996 41,920 26,023,979 26,065,899
1997 16,072 34,449,290 34,465,362
1998 4,122,242 48,424,493 52,546,735
Variation 96/95 -78% -3% -3%
Variation 97/96 -62% 32% 32%
Variation 98/97 25,549% 41% 52%
__________