Afronline – The Voice Of Africa

Non-governmental organisations have expressed their satisfaction at the European Commission’s declaration that it would not put “undue pressure” on African and other countries to conclude the controversial trade deals called economic partnership agreements (EPAs).

“The Commission continues to seek tailor-made solutions for all countries within a regional EPA in order to secure their duty-free, quota-free access to the EU and provide an improved framework for their economic development. It considers that it is up to the ACP (African, Caribbean and Pacific) partners themselves to decide which type of trade-related rules they want to negotiate at this stage and to what extent.”

This statement by the European Commission (EC), released on Oct 1, sounds like a victory for the Stop EPA Campaign which has been running for years now.

On Sep 27, the seventh anniversary of the EPA talks, more than 80 organisations from 30 countries called for a fundamental change in the course of the ongoing EPA negotiations between the European Union and the ACP countries.

“We are very satisfied that the campaign has been able to convince many people that the EPAs don’t lead to development and that the ACP countries have to be given time,” Marc Maes from 11.11.11, a coalition of Belgian non-governmental organisations (NGOs), told IPS in an interview.

“In 2002, everybody believed the development rhetoric of the EC but more and more people have become sceptical and today the EC seems to be finally agreeing not to put pressure on the ACP states and to respect their political choices. But we have to be careful because rhetoric and practice are often very different.”

The EPAs are meant to replace the preferential unilateral market access historically accorded the ACP states under successive Lomé Conventions. The EU’s reasoning is that the Lomé regime is incompatible with World Trade Organisation (WTO) rules.

The 2000 Cotonou agreement laid the groundwork and the EPAs talks, run on a regional basis, were supposed to be concluded by the end of 2007.

But today only one region out of six — the Caribbean — has signed a comprehensive EPA with the EU. Other countries have only accepted individual interim agreements and only on the liberalisation of trade in goods.

According to Maes, when the negotiations started, “the EC came with a mandate that went far beyond the Cotonou agreement and WTO requirements to include services, investment, government procurement, competition law, trade facilitation, intellectual property rights and data protection.”

Investment, competition and government procurement, also known as the “Singapore issues”, were thrown out of the WTO Doha Development Round in July 2004 due to the fierce opposition of developing countries.

“The EC pressure on the ACP countries comes down to stalking,” argued Maes. “We ask the EC not to pressurise these countries to negotiate reciprocal agreements and not to push them to negotiate the ‘Singapore’ and other non-goods issues. More than half of the ACP countries are LDCs (least developed countries) and in the WTO no reciprocity is required from them.”

But, rebutted John Clarke, deputy head of the delegation of the European Commission in Geneva, “the EC and the ACP countries decided to go further than the WTO because it is a better choice”.

“The Caribbean states, whose comparative advantage lies in services such as tourism and financial services, were very keen to have an agreement that included services and investment. Other ACP regions are not so keen and it is their choice but we think it is a pity because services are important.”

By Isolda Agazzi – The full story on IPS Africa