ACP member states express concerns over unresolved issues

The African  Caribbean and Pacific  (ACP) member states have been expressing concerns about unresolved issues, including Most Favoured Nations (MFNs), rules of origin, market access,  export taxes and the need to ascertain the net fiscal impact on their economies before tariff reduction agreements.

At the ACP Council of Ministers Meeting held in Quagadougou, Burkina Faso on June 17 to 19, Minister of Foreign Affairs Carolyn Rodrigues-Birkett and Guyana’s Ambassador to Belgium Patrick Gomes represented Guyana at the meeting which preceded the joint ACP-EU Council meeting, a media release stated.

The ACP Council discussed several important issues including the status of the Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs), trade in bananas, sugar and cotton, climate change and the Millennium  Development Goals.

Member states of the various groupings expressed concern regarding the many issues that still remain unresolved but these were the very issues Guyana had raised prior to signing the EPA, the release noted.

Guyana, however, eventually had to sign to avoid trade disruptions as was the case with several others who signed or initialled interim agreements.

The EU is now being asked to revisit some of these conditions  which the ACP finds difficult to accept.

It should be noted that the other five negotiating groups are advocating for an automatic five-year review to be included in the EPAs. It was Guyana that had advocated for this provision for the Cariforum EPA, the release said.

The ACP group noted that the European Commission had concluded negotiations on a free trade agreement with the Group of Central American countries, which include concessions on market access for sugar and which will further erode the preferences accorded to ACP countries in their respective EPAs, thus  adversely affecting their competitiveness.        

And they expressed concern that the European Commission failed to properly consult the ACP on these trade arrangements as called for by the Cotonou Agreement and their EPAs.

The group took note, however,  that the European Union has begun the process of reforming its Common Agricultural Policy for 2013 and called for the EU to ensure that the ACP producers, along with the EU producers, be provided with fair, stable and reasonably remunerative EU market prices and guaranteed priority access.

They also called for the European Union and the Commission “to take into account the fact that major investments  in sugarcane industries are amortized over long periods, hence the need for continuing preferential sugar access  beyond 2015”.

They further asked  that the EU and the commission “ensure that the new provision of the Cotonou Agree-ment regarding the need to review support programmes such as the Accompanying Measures Support Programme, with a view to deciding on appropriate additional measures to be implemented, is respected in order to guarantee EC’s commitment  to continue to support the ACP commodity sector, including sugar, beyond 2013.”

Council chairmanship

Guyana will be chairing the ACP Council as of August 1, 2010  for a period of six months. Guyana had last chaired the council in 1998.

Rodrigues-Birkett as incoming chairperson told the council that Guyana continues to value deeply the work of the ACP, not least because of the role it has played in the birth of the organisation as evidenced by the Georgetown Accord.

The Foreign Affairs Minister also highlighted the need for an assessment of the organisation in the context of the new and ever changing global environment.

Since the EPA process was launched eight years ago, only 27 of the 78 ACP countries have signed full or interim agreements including the Cariforum group. An additional nine have simply initialled agreements, the release added.