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1. WTO ISSUES GROUPS CONSULTATIONS MEETINGS BETWEEN COMMISSION AND 'CIVIL SOCIETY'
The Commission held its first session of WTO 'issues groups' consultation meetings with civil society and other stakeholders on 29 and 30 May in Brussels. The 'issues groups' consultations were set up by the Commission to focus discussions on the WTO round with civil society on specific topics. The first four issues chosen for discussion are: Trade and Health Issues (including among others, access to medicines), Services, Agriculture, and Environment (including sustainable development). Six meetings on these issues will be held over the coming months. Meetings are tentatively scheduled for the last Monday and Tuesday of every month. Due to the holidays there will be no meetings in July and August.
(See http://europa.eu.int/comm/trade/2000_round/dialngo.htm)
Meeting on Trade and Health Issues
Issues on the agenda were: consumer health, access to healthcare and trade, public health services and access to medicines and trade. The Commission presented a briefing paper on the issue of access to medicines and trade. The paper states that the issue of trade and access to medicines is now seen more widely as access to health, because it relates to a wide range of issues such as economic development, insufficient health care, transfer of technology, poor education, etc. In this context, the Commission Directorate for Trade has had a meeting with the Directorate for Development and other Commission services. The results of these discussions have been fed into the preparation of a Communication by the Directorate for Development on Communicable diseases and poverty in developing countries, due out soon. On TRIPs the Commission stated that its first priority is the implementation of the existing agreement. This agreement should be reflected in the legislation of the countries, which have signed up to it. At the TRIPs Council in June in Geneva, the EU may resort to dispute settlement, if the Commission find that there are major shortcomings in the adoption of TRIPs in the legislation of some countries.
Meeting on Services
The Commission gave the state of play on the ongoing WTO negotiations on services. According to the Commission participants are still discussing how to structure the negotiations. There is still no agreement on what the next steps should be. The EU had hoped to reach an agreement on the programme of negotiations by now, and to have the "requests" (WTO members' indications of what they want from other members in the field of services) tabled by the end of 2000. Then the "offers" (replies to the requests of other members) could start and be finished by the end of 2001. Actual negotiations would then begin in 2002. This timetable however now seems unlikely to be met.
Meeting on the Environment
The Commission expressed the need to find a way of 'overcoming developing countries paranoia' on environmental issues. It was also pointed out that most developed countries also opposed the EU position on the environment. DG environment acknowledged that the EU needed to be much clearer about its environmental goals and that in particular it should clearly state what is not intended by them and make it clear that it does not want to impose its environmental rules on developing countries. The Commission identified a number of issues for future discussion including Multilateral Environmental Agreements, labelling, 'Sustainable development' including sustainability impact assessments, special and differential treatment including incentives for developing countries, post-Lomé trade agreements and TRIPs.
Meeting on Agriculture
According NGO participants at the Agriculture meeting, this meeting lacked a clear agenda or focus. The issue of food security was again avoided by the Commission representatives who chaired the meeting. However all participants have been advised to send suggestions for future agendas for the discussion on agriculture to Mr Haitze Siemers of the European Commission, Tel: +32 299 01 85; Email: [email protected]
Several Eurostep members will be pushing for food security to be placed on the agenda.
Initial NGO views on the meetings
Following the meetings a group of development, trade and environmental NGOs met to exchange views. There was a general view that the Commission’s Directorate for Development should have been involved in the discussions. Even though the Development Directorate was invited, none of their representatives showed up at any of the meetings. Most of the participants at the meetings were representatives of business and industry, with very little representation from development NGOs. Some NGOs were also of the view that, future meetings should not be chaired by the Commission. All civil society actors are advised to send their comments or suggestions for future meetings to Mr Haitze Siemers as soon as possible.
2. BENIN BOTSWANA JAMAICA AND MAURITIUS APPLY TO HOST SIGNING CEREMONY OF NEW ACP-EU AGREEMENT
Following Fiji’s formal withdrawal of its candidacy to host the signing of the new ACP-EU Agreement, new candidates to host the signing have emerged. Benin, Botswana, Jamaica and Mauritius have all applied to host the signing of this Agreement.
According to ACP diplomats, ACP States wish to organise the event before 30 June for three reasons: 1) To avoid having to renew the interim measures that extended application of the current Lomé Convention. These measures expire on 30 July. 2) To ensure that the Agreement is signed before July when the ACP Secretariat is scheduled to propose reforms of the ACP Council. 3) To increase the chances of obtaining a WTO response to the request for a waiver for non-reciprocal preferential trade arrangements. The ACP group fear that this request will not be examined before the ACP-EU Agreement is signed.
3. EUROSTEP MEMBERS PRESENT AT THE BEIJING+5 FOLLOW UP IN NEW YORK
Six Eurostep members will be present in New York for the review of the Review of the UN Fourth World Conference on Women. ActionAid UK, Oxfam UK, Norwegian People’s Aid, KEPA (Finland), Swiss Coalition and DWHH (German Agro Action). The two last mentioned will be on the official delegations of Switzerland and Germany respectively.
Two events (Round Tables) on “Girl’s Education: Quality and Retention” and “Anti-trafficking in Women” will be arranged back to back on 3 June 13-00 to 15.00 at the Church Center, 777 UN Plaza by ACTIONAID and Oxfam UK.
4. FORTHCOMING EVENTS
| 5-6 June Brussels, European Parliament | Convention on EU’s Charter of Fundamental Rights |
| 7-8 June Brussels | Rio Conference on Sustainable Development in 2002 Tel: 00 32 2 771 15 34 |
| 8 June Brussels | Priorities and Challenges of the French Presidency meeting Tel 00 32 2 231 03 40 |
| 12-16 June Limerick, Ireland | Asia Europe Young Leaders Symposium IV Email: [email protected] |
| 19-20 June Paris | 3rd Informal Human Rights Seminar email: [email protected] |
| 21 June South Africa | EU Development Commissioner visits |
5. IN BRIEF
The European Commission is to contribute
one million Euros to a World Bank programme on training and
technologies in the framework of higher education in sub-Saharan
Africa. The programme entitled African Virtual University uses
modern technology to provide the poorest countries of Africa
direct access to good training and educational resources in the
world.
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