PAF  ProActive File  - Regular News Update from Eurostep

No. 305
7 March 2003

1. European Commission Briefing meeting with civil society on ACP-EU trade negotiations

 The European Commission’s DG Trade organised a briefing meeting with civil society on the ACP-EU negotiations this week as part of its system of dialogue meetings with civil society on trade issues. The meeting was supposed to provide the Commission with the opportunity to present the results of the last negotiations rounds to civil society, notably the 5th ACP-EU Ministerial Committee meeting in St Lucia; and for the EU NGO Cotonou Monitoring Group to present a letter sent EU Commissioner for Trade, Pascal Lamy, expressing concerns on the negotiations. The meeting also discussed the four discussion papers on the negotiations released by the European Commission. See http://europa.eu.int/comm/trade/bilateral/acp/epas.htm

The European Commission representative in his presentation stated that no official reports had been produced following the meeting in St Lucia, and no specific conclusions had been reached. But he stated that the general feeling about the meeting from both parties was that it was constructive. He said both the ACP and the EU agreed that mechanisms should be developed to systematically consult civil society on the negotiations, but the ACP preferred that both parties developed separate mechanisms for ‘their’ civil society actors as opposed to joint mechanisms. The Commission is proposing that before regional negotiations start, consultations should be held with respective stakeholders on the best mechanisms for information and consultation. These mechanisms could build on existing information and consultation structures and might therefore vary in the different countries and regions. It is then proposed to that the results of these consultations are reported at the all-ACP level in May 2003.

The Commission representative also expressed its hope that the first phase of the negotiations would be closed in July to allow the second phase, which will be conducted between the EU and the ACP sub-regions to start in September 2003. However, when asked what would be done if by September not all ACP sub-regions were clearly defined, he said the Commission favours a flexible approach whereby those regions, which are ready could start, while the others wait till they are ready. According to the Commission the regions of West Africa and Central Africa have already expressed their readiness to negotiate in September. The Caribbean is also supposed to be close to being prepared, but Eastern and Southern Africa according to the Commission may still have some work to do.

Concerning the letter from the Cotonou Monitoring Group to Commissioner Lamy, (see http://www.eurostep.org/pubs/position/acp-eu-cotonou/acp030225.pdf ), the Commission representative expressed his alarm that many in the ACP civil society community did not have confidence that Economic Partnership Agreements could advance poverty eradication and said that more work would have to be done in this area. Regarding dialogue with civil society within ACP countries, he admitted that EU delegations would have to do more. The Commission is looking at strengthening delegations’ capacity with training sessions and providing extra capacity through contracts with local people.

Regarding the NGOs demand for more resources to address trade adjustment costs in the ACP he said the Commission would find it very hard to request more money from EU Member States while money was still left over from previous European Development Funds (EDFs). Furthermore he argued that the exact needs would have to be determined before a request for new money could be made.

Concerning discussions on the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) within the ACP-EU negotiations, he said the Commission was prepared to do this but would not negotiate the CAP with ACP partners.

Guggi Laryea in presenting the Cotonou Monitoring Group letter to Lamy emphasised that the problems that have slowed down the use of previous EDFs need to be tackled to ensure that adequate resources are provided to meet the ACP costs. While acknowledging that needs assessments for resources had not been conducted, he pointed out that the funds provided to the pre-accession countries to the EC in order to participate in the EC common market already gives an idea of the scale of resources required.

Karin Ulmer of APRODEV also representing the Cotonou Monitoring Group pointed out that the current draft text being circulated within the WTO negotiations on agriculture does very little in terms of proposals for relief to hardship faced by farmers in developing countries. She called on the Commission to ensure that new ACP-EU trade arrangements take a different approach.

On the four Commission discussion papers on the negotiations, NGOs called for more clarification on the Commission proposal to establish a structure at the all-ACP level to maintain transparency and coherence with regard to the different regional negotiating processes once the regional negotiations start. The structure would consist of representatives of the different ACP regional groupings, the ACP Secretariat and the EU. For more information on the result of the last negotiating rounds and a press release from he ACP Secretariat on the 5th ACP-EC Ministerial Committee see http://www.acpsec.org/

2. Discussions on the review of the ALA Regulation

Discussions around the EU Asia-Latin America (ALA) Regulation are growing following a series of events including the recent European Parliament Hearing on ALA and Eurostep and partner’s discussions with EU officials last month. (See newsletter PAF 203)

During the discussions, EU Commissioner for Development, Poul Nielson, conceded that the regulation needs to be better clarified, but still argued that Commission would still like to see a flexible regulation, stressing that it is a financial instrument not a policy document. Poverty therefore should be addressed through trade and development. According to the Commissioner anything too detailed in the regulation might not be applicable to all circumstances. Therefore planning and programming should be left to the Country Strategy Papers for the individual Asian and Latin America countries.

Many of the MEPs and Member State representatives agreed on the different points put forward by civil society representatives during the discussions. MEP Maria Sargren (Sweden) agreed with the view that there is too much flexibility in the Commission’s proposal on the regulation.

The total budget of EU aid to Asia and Latin America is € 3.8 billion EUR in 2003-2006. See http://www.eurostep.org/strategy/ala/ALA_review.html

3. Conference on gender equality and the future of Europe

The European Commission organised a conference on Gender Equality and the Future of Europe in 4 March, in connection with international women’s day on 8 March, on the initiative of EU Commissioner for Education and Culture Viviane Reding. The Commissioner’s conclusion at the end of the conference was that the best way to take account of the notion of equality between men and women would be to include an article on this with direct applicability in the EU Constitutional Treaty. The Commissioner stated that, “Only a directly applicable provision in the Treaty outlawing any discrimination on the basis of gender would ensure effective equality between the sexes.”

The main conclusions of the Conference were as follows:

  1. Equality between the sexes should be a priority of the EU legal system;

  2. the right to equality should be directly applicable;

  3. the candidate countries’ priority should be to implement the legal framework between men and women;

  4. the Constitutional Treaty should make specific provisions to ban all discrimination on the basis of gender and promote voluntary equality between the sexes;

  5. the legal basis for gender equality should be extended beyond social policy to all Commission policies.

4. In Brief

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