L 2816 Official Journal of the European Communities 3.2.2000 COUNCIL REGULATION (EC) No 254/2000 of 31 January 2000 amending Regulation (EEC) No 2658/87 on the tariff and statistical nomenclature and the Common Customs Tariff THE COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN UNION, Having regard to the Treaty establishing the European Community, in particular Articles 26 and 133 thereof, Having regard to the proposal from the Commission, Whereas: (1) Regulation (EEC) No 2658/87 (), provides the legal basis for the establishment and management of the Combined Nomenclature, the Common Customs Tariff and the Integrated Tariff of the Communities (Taric); () It is appropriate to modernise and to simplify the presentation and the management of Regulation (EEC) No 2658/87 as envisaged by the SLIM initiative (Simpler Legislation for the Internal Market); (3)  The data contained in Regulation (EEC) No 2658/87 and other data published by virtue of the said Regulation, and in particular Articles 6 and 9 thereof, should, when- ever possible, also be made available to the public in electronic format; (4) The schedule of customs duties in Annex I, Part II, to Regulation (EEC) No 2658/87 includes in columns 3 and 4 respectively the autonomous and the conventional duty rates; with a view to rationalising and simplifying the use of this schedule, only one of these columns should be maintained and this column should reflect the conventional duty rates; any exception from the applica- tion of a conventional rate of duty by autonomous measures should nevertheless be indicated; (5)  Statistical requirements are normally covered at the level of the Combined Nomenclature; in order to limit the number of CN subheadings and to avoid parallel data collection systems it is, in certain cases, more appro- priate to satisfy such requirements by creating Taric subdivisions for statistical purposes; (6) A code of conduct for managing the CN has been estab- lished in order to limit the unjustified growth in the number of CN codes and statistical subdivisions of the Taric; (7)  The current definition of the Taric, the coverage of its measures, the composition of its codes and the descrip- tion of its management, data transmission and publica- () OJ L 256, 7.9.1987, p. 1. Regulation as last amended by Regulation (EC) No 2204/1999 (O] L 278, 28.10.1999, p. 1). tion should be revised in order to take account of recent developments; (8)  The collaboration of Member States' customs labora- tories should be encouraged in order to ensure a uniform application of the Common Customs Tariff and the Taric; (9)  The Customs Tariff of the European Communities has been defined by Article 20(3) of Council Regulation (EEC) No 2913/92 of 12 October 1992 establishing the Community Customs Code (%); it is consequently no longer necessary to provide a definition of the Common Customs Tariff in this Regulation; the use of the Combined Nomenclature for external trade statistics has already been set out in Article 1 of Regulation (EEC) No 2658/87 and in Article 8 of Council Regulation (EC) No 1172/95 of 22 May 1995 on the statistics relating to the trading of goods by the Community and its Member States with non-member countries (*); Article 4 of Regu- lation (EEC) No 2658/87 can therefore be deleted; (100 Commission Regulation (EEC) No 2454/93 of 2 July 1993 laying down provisions for the implementation of Council Regulation (EEC) No 2913/92 establishing the Community Customs Code (%), sets out the rules for the codes to be entered in customs declarations at Community and Member State level; (11)  The measures necessary for the implementation of Regu- lation (EEC) No 265887 should be adopted in accord- ance with Council Decision 1999/468/EC of 28 June 1999 laying down the procedures for the exercise of implementing powers conferred on the Commission (°), HAS ADOPTED THIS REGULATION: Article 1 Regulation (EEC) No 2658/87 is hereby amended as follows: 1. Article 1(1) shall be replaced by the following: ‘1. A goods nomenclature, hereinafter called the “Combined Nomenclature”, or in abbreviated form “CN”, which meets at one and the same time, the requirements of the Common Customs Tariff, the external trade statistics of the Community and other Community policies concerning the importation or exportation of goods shall be established by the Commission.’; () OJ L 302, 19.10.1992, p. 1. Regulation as last amended by Regula- tion (EC) No 955/1999 (O] L 119, 7.5.1999. p. 1). () OJ L 118, 25.5.1995, p. 10. Regulation as last amended by Regula- tion (EC) No 374/98 (O] L 48, 19.2.1998, p. 1). () OJ L 253, 11.10.1993, p. 1. Regulation as last amended by Regula- tion (EC) No 16621999 (O] L 197, 29.7.1999, p. 25). () O L 184, 17.7.1999, p. 23.