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Africa wants better trade pacts with European Union
2006-04-15 08:56:51
By Correspondent
African countries said on Thursday in Nairobi they wanted the European Union to fully open its market to the continent’s products and provide financial support to enable poor countries to cope with a new trade deal.
The EU is negotiating with African, Caribbean and Pacific nations to bring the so-called economic partnership agreements (EPAs) into force by Jan. 1, 2008.
The EPAs are intended to replace the 2000 Cotonou agreement that allows for preferential trade to the EU, and will eventually lead to a full trade liberalisation.
But African countries say their industries and farmers would be hurt by competition brought by further liberalisation.
’For African countries, the most important thing is that they don’t lose access (through the EPAs) but improve access to the European market,’ said Xavier Carim, a senior South African trade negotiator.
’The main concern is that they want to get enough support and would have to open up to European goods that would undermine their own industrial base,’ he added.
The EU is negotiating the trade pacts with four regional groupings from the west, eastern, central and southern Africa.
The EPAs are focused on six areas - development, market access, services, agriculture, fisheries and trade-related issues - but negotiations have stumbled on the issue of aid, seen by African negotiators as a key component of development.
A draft declaration on the EPAs, circulated at a conference of trade experts from the 53-member African Union (AU) meeting in Kenya, said the EU had not fully taken into account Africa’s demand that the negotiations should focus on development.
’PROFOUND DISAPPOINTMENT’
’We express our profound disappointment at the stance taken by negotiators of the European Community and its member states so far, which does not adequately address this critical bedrock that must be the basis of relations with Africa,’ the draft said.
It added that the EU was restricting entry to its market using health, technical and market standards.
The experts’ meeting precedes a meeting of African trade ministers on Friday seeking to establish a common position in EU negotiations and global trade talks in the World Trade Organisation (WTO), and to promote regional integration.
EU Trade Representative Karl Falkenberg defended the bloc, saying no African nation would be disadvantaged by the EPA agreements.
He said the EU was interested in boosting Africa’s competitiveness by giving adequate funds to address the bottlenecks that undermine the continent.
’In EPAs, Europe wants to become a partner in building credible, transparent conditions for regional trading,’ Falkenberg told reporters in Nairobi.
Falkenberg said the EU is the biggest trade partner for Africa and imports about 70 percent of agro-foods from Africa.
Some experts said despite their misgivings African countries had few options but to engage in the negotiations.
’EPAs are a devil we can’t live without just like the WTO,’ Ntetleng Masisi, a senior Botswana trade official said.
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