Apr 21, 2009 1:31 pm US/Central
Restaurants Protest Mineral Water Duty Hike
More Than 60 Chicago Italian Restaurants Protest
CHICAGO (Sun-Times Media Wire) ―
More than 60 of Chicago's Italian restaurants -- including well-known spots like Spiaggia, The Italian Village and Phil Stefani's 437 Rush -- have signed a petition requesting sanctions against Italian mineral water, scheduled to take effect Thursday, be suspended.
The sanctions comprise a 100 percent import duty on Italian mineral water and, according to a release from the Italian American Chamber of Commerce-Midwest, effectively doubling its price.
U.S. Trade Representative Ambassador Ronald Kirk modified the list of European products subject to import duties authorized by the World Trade Organization up to a value of $117 million, the release said.
This revision (called Carousel) involves 35 items from 26 countries and is aimed to put pressure on Europe to restart negotiations on U.S. hormone beef which the EU currently prohibits. It is discriminatory, the group says, because it singles out mineral water from Italy alone, while other European mineral waters remain sanction-free.
"It damages the economy of both Italy and the U.S. at a time when neither country can afford more economic pain," chamber President Robert Allegrini said. "Restaurants will no longer be able to afford to carry Italian mineral water because they won't be able to sell it at the prices they will have to charge."
The mineral water duty would "deprive restaurateurs which are already facing a difficult environment from a source of revenue that many patrons of Italian restaurants order on a regular basis," Italian Village owner Alfredo Capitanini said.
Italy currently produces 12 percent of the world's mineral water, 40 percent of which is exported to the United States.
(Source: Sun-Times Media Wire © Chicago Sun-Times 2009. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
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