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The EU and the United Kingdom have conducted intensive negotiations to agree on the terms of the UK's withdrawal and create legal certainty once EU law ceases to apply to the UK.
The Withdrawal Agreement provides for a transition period until at least 31 December 2020, during which the UK remains a member of the Single Market and Customs Union. Until then, it will be business as usual for citizens, consumers, businesses, investors, students and researchers in both the EU and the United Kingdom. The United Kingdom will no longer be represented in the EU institutions, agencies, bodies and offices but EU law will still apply in the United Kingdom until the end of the transition period.
The Withdrawal Agreement ensures that a good that has already been placed on the market can continue to be made available on the UK market and the EU Single Market after the end of the transition period. However, live animals and animal products, such as animal-derived food, will, as from the end of the transition period, have to comply with the EU or the UK's rules on imports from third countries.
The Withdrawal Agreement provides that goods lawfully placed on the market in the EU or the United Kingdom before the end of the transition period may continue to freely circulate in and between these two markets, until they reach their end-users, without any need for product modifications or re-labelling. By way of exception, the movement of live animals and animal products between the Union market and the UK market will, as from the end of the transition period, be subject to the applicable rules of the Parties on imports and sanitary controls at the border, regardless of whether they were placed on the market before the end of the transition period. This is necessary in view of the high sanitary risks associated with such products, and the need for effective veterinary controls when these products, as well as live animals, enter the Union market or the UK market.
31 January 2020/ EC/ European Union.
https://ec.europa.eu
