President Bharrat Jagdeo doubts whether Guyana would affix its signature to the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) between the European Union and the Cariforum countries when the Caricom Heads of Government meet in Antigua and Barbuda next week.

Speaking with the media at a press conference he hosted at the Office of the President yesterday, Jagdeo said that he expects there would be a healthy debate on whether the region – Caricom countries and the Dominican Republic – is prepared to sign the agreement.

“I doubt whether next week we are going to sign any agreement in Antigua and Barbuda on the EPA,” he said, adding that “I doubt whether Guyana would affix its signature at that stage to the agreement.”

Asked what the implications would be if the agreement was not signed, Jagdeo said, “We are yet to study that.”

He has looked at several legal opinions and they vary, he said, with some thinking that if the Cariforum countries do not sign the trade agreement, the region could be subjected to tariffs under the Generalised System of Preferences (GSP) immediately. The GSP is a formal system of exemption from the more general rules of the World Trade Organisation. It is a system of exemption from the Most Favoured Nation (MFN) principle that obligates WTO member countries to treat the imports of all other WTO member countries no worse than they treat the imports of their “most favored” trading partner.

This means that MFN requires WTO member countries to treat imports coming from all other WTO member countries equally, that is, by imposing equal tariffs.

Jagdeo said that on the other hand others feel that as the European Union has taken several years to ratify some agreements that they had signed or had initialled, a precedent has been set. They feel that the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) group of countries could also take several years to ratify the agreements without facing the consequences of punitive measures. “So the legal opinions vary. I have a wait and see approach,” he said.

New trading arrangements under the EPAs are in response to continuing criticisms from WTO members that the non-reciprocal and discriminating preferential trade agreements offered by the EU are incompatible with WTO rules.

President Jagdeo has been critical of the terms of the EPA agreement.