Italy and seven other EU countries asked the European Commission on 24 November to allow them to limit rice imports from Cambodia, on the grounds of protecting the Italian and European rice industry. In the past five years, European imports of rice from Cambodia more than doubled, negatively impacting the EU’s trade balance with this country (total imports of goods exceed exports by €3.9 billion in 2016). Under the safeguard clause inscribed in the founding treaty of the European Community, when imports from a third country hurt the trade balance of any EU country, member states can request the Commission to introduce trade barriers “to remedy the situation.