VANUATU: Trade ministers hear concerns on meeting EU deadline
Updated
A meeting of trade ministers in the Pacific has heard of concerns in sealing an economic partnership agreement with the European Union. The meeting is one of two gatherings on trade taking place in the Vanuatu capital Port Vila this week.
Presenter: Samisoni Pareti
Speakers: Peter Forau, deputy secretary general Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat
PARETI: Five months before the deadline for adopting an economic partnership agreement or EPA with the European Union, Pacific members of the African, Caribbean and Pacific group of countries have been warned to prepare for the possibility that some of them may not meet the deadline.
The warning was issued by Peter Forau, deputy secretary general of the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat when the trade ministers who are members of the Pacific ACP opened here at the Le Lagon Resort on Tuesday.
Mr Forau says despite the concerted efforts of the Pacific, there has been "little movement" in concluding their EPA with Europe, especially in the key areas of rules of origin, fisheries, investment and labour mobility.
FORAU: Given this rather less than optimistic outcome of the negotiations thus far and in spite of the PACP states commitment to conclude the EPA negotiations by end of this year, the PACP region or even individual PACP states may find themselves not in a position to agree to concluding an EPA. The likelihood of a December 31st deadline being met has also been questioned by other ACP negotiating regions in Africa and the Caribbean. The same sentiments were also expressed in different forums by other stakeholders, including civil society organisations and the private sector.
PARETI: Much of the delay Mr Forau says is with the European Union.
Their responses to the Pacific's non-papers and position papers have been slow, and when those responses are eventually received, they are becoming more pointed by the day.
FORAU: Can we do a bit to encourage the responses from the European Union? Is there time to consider new options or can we look within the existing mandates to identify possible changes in order to afford flexibility to our approach? Our ... these are some of the key questions that must guide current discussions on the EPAs. I want to make clear that it would be no insigificant oversight if the PACP states did not account for the signals coming through from the European Union in regards the rate of demands placed before them. These signals are getting more and more pointed and being progressively converted into conditionalities on the PACP states. If this is the basis on which to judge what might happen post-December 2007 the prospects are considerably bleak because the PACP states might just end up facing more stringent conditionalities and more uncertainty. That will be to no one's benefit and certainly a bad investment on our part.
PARETI: The onus the Forum senior official says is at the hands of the trade ministers.
At the end of the day Mr Forau told them, any credit or criticism on the agreement will fall on them.
Their objective therefore should be an EPA with Europe that is development oriented.
FORAU: Given the unlikely prospect of conclucing entire EPA text by 31st December 2007 the PACP states will need to clarify the legal commitments and institutional consequences of the failure of an individual PACP country or the PACP region to sign an EPA by the end of 2007. Paramount to these consents however is the need to conclude EPAs that deliver on the PACP's development objectives rather than meeting arbitrary deadlines. It could be argued that the best way to avoid any disruption in the implementation of an EPA is to negotiate a good EPA, one that responds to the aspiration and key objectives of parties, particularly in terms of development and poverty alleviation.
PARETI: The trade ministers are also expected to discuss their proposed agreement with Australia and New Zealand known as PACER and the appointment of a Chief Trade Negotiator to lead the region's negotiations of PACER.
Vanuatu has already offered to host the negotiator most probably housing the position at the new headquarters of the Melanesian Spearhead Group Secretariat currently under construction in Port Vila.
At the Pacific trade ministers meeting in Vanuatu for Pacific Beat, I'm Samisoni Pareti.
