EU–Pakistan Agreement: modification of concessions on all the tariff rate quotas included in the EU Schedule CLXXV as a consequence of the United Kingdom's withdrawal from the European Union

The European Parliament adopted by 276 votes to 13, with 9 abstentions, a legislative resolution on the draft Council decision on the conclusion, on behalf of the Union, of the Agreement in the form of an Exchange of Letters between the European Union and the Islamic Republic of Pakistan pursuant to Article XXVIII of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) 1994 relating to the modification of concessions on all the tariff-rate quotas included in the EU Schedule CLXXV as a consequence of the United Kingdom's withdrawal from the European Union.

Parliament gave its consent to the conclusion of the agreement.

As a reminder, in October 2018, the EU formally launched the negotiations process under Article XXVIII of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) of 1994 with a number of WTO Members in Geneva. The underlying principle of the negotiations is a ‘joint approach’ developed between the EU and the UK back in 2017 on how to ‘apportion’ the quantitative commitments contained in the EU28 WTO schedule for the 143 EU agricultural, fish and industrial WTO tariff rate quotas (TRQs). The basis is that the existing volume of each TRQ would be fully maintained in the future, but split across two separate customs territories: the EU27 and the UK.

On 15 June 2018, the Council authorised the Commission to launch negotiations under Article XXVIII GATT with the relevant WTO Members for apportioning the Union's WTO concessions on TRQs.

The Islamic Republic of Pakistan has negotiating rights for one TRQ (for tariff item number 1006 20 only) and consultation rights for five TRQs. For the husked (brown) rice TRQ, where Pakistan has negotiating rights, the original EU proposed apportioned volume was accepted by Pakistan. The European Union explicitly recognises that Pakistan has initial negotiating rights (INR) with respect to the concessions on tariff item number 1006 20, in accordance with the relevant provisions of Article XXVIII of the GATT 1994.

The agreement with Pakistan is made in accordance with the EU-UK ‘joint approach’ of maintaining the existing overall EU28 TRQ volumes split into two separate customs territories in the future.

Negotiations with Pakistan resulted in an agreement initialled on 25 January 2021 in Geneva. The agreement was finally signed on 3 February 2026, and the Council submitted it to the European Parliament on 5 February 2026.