ARTICLE 17 Subsidies 1. If a Partner State grants or maintains any subsidy, including any form of income or price support which operates directly or indirectly to distort competition by favouring certain undertakings or the production of certain goods in the Partner State, it shall notify the other Partner States in writing. 2. The notification in paragraph 1 of this Article shall contain the extent and nature of the subsidisation, the estimated effect of the subsidisation, the quantity of the affected product or products exported to the Partner States and the circumstances making the subsidisation necessary. ARTICLE 18 Countervailing Measures 1. (a) The Community may, for the purposes of offsetting the effects of subsidies and subject to regulations made under this Article, levy a countervailing duty on any product of any foreign country imported into the Customs Union. (b) The countervailing duty shall be equal to the amount of the estimated subsidy determined to have been granted directly or indirectly, on the manufacture, production or export of that product in the country of origin or exportation. 2. The implementation of Articles 17 and 18 of this Protocol shall be in accordance with the East African Community Customs Union (Subsidies and Countervailing Measures) Regulations, specified in Annex V to this Protocol. ARTICLE 19 Safeguard Measures 1. The Partner States agree to apply safeguard measures to situations where there is a sudden surge of a product imported into a Partner State, under conditions which cause or threaten to cause serious injury to domestic producers in the territory of like or directly competing products within the territory. 2. (a) During a transitional period of five years, after the coming into force of the Protocol, where a Partner State demonstrates that its economy will suffer serious injury as a result of the imposition of the common external tariff 19