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EU introduces โฌ3 customs charge on small parcels to curb cheap Chinese imports
(www.theguardian.com)
this post was submitted on 29 Jun 2026
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Important bit of information: China gets subsidised parcel fee under an agreement of the World Post Association. They pay less for postage than European businesses shipping within the continent.
Why is this not changed? Why all these additional taxes and hoops when they could simply cancels these subsidies?
It's managed by the Universal Postal Union, which is part of the UN, and the organisation has been in effect in one form or another since 1874 with 192 members currently. International treaties between so many countries are extremely difficult to reform. It's much easier to make a new treaty than reform an existing one because there are so many vested interests in the current system.
In this case, the subsidy is designed to help developing countries have fair access to the global post system. But when it was created, it was likely not envisioned that a developing country might become a rich country, nor that the postal system would become such an important part of e-commerce.
easier to add a new agreement than cancel an old i guess. treaties are hard
Good question. I guess you have to ask those responsible.
I've wondered for years how they manage free shipping for all the small shit.
I'm guessing it just goes on flights that would be going anyway, probably filling in gaps where larger packages don't fit which would just be empty anyway.
No clue what agreements they have with the carriers to let them do that for dirt cheap, but it's the only thing that makes sense.