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ROSEAU, Dominica, CMC – A senior public sector official Monday defended the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) signed between the European Union and the Caribbean Forum (CARIFORUM) countries saying that “it is more than about trade in goods”.
Addressing a national consultation of the EPA accord that was signed in 2008, Carleen Roberts, the National Authorizing Officer for the EU Development Fund, said that the EPA is about regional integration and other aspects of trade integration.
She told the conference that “regional experts forecast that the Caribbean EPA will generate most of the future growth in the region’s service sector and creative industries such as music and film making.”
She reminded the audience that Caribbean exporters previously had greater duty free access to the EU market than European exporters enjoyed in the Caribbean “along with quotas that enabled them to avoid price competition with rivals from outside the Lome-ACP bloc.
She said with the World Trade Organization (WTO) being established in 1995, the EU and the Caribbean were forced to negotiate new terms of trade engagement.
“The EPA represented a shift towards a more liberal trading regime in which greater reciprocity is the norm,” she said, adding the “EPAs also give special attention to individual ACP (African Caribbean and Pacific) countries…and design their own strategies for achieving growth and prosperity.
“EPAs are aimed at promoting sustainable development and growth, poverty reduction, better governance and the gradual integration of ACP countries into the world economy,” she said.
The official said that while in the past ACP exports have had preferential access to EU markets, the volume of their exports had declined.
“The EPA seeks to counter this trend by providing a broad range of measures to help the ACP trade more with all countries,” she said, adding that “ACP countries need to ensure their exports comply with changing European standards, including food safety and animal welfare”.
Roberts said that many ACP countries “simply lack the basic infrastructure to trade with each other (and) administrative procedures could also be an obstacle.
Earlier, EPA Coordinator Yvanette Baron-George said that the adjusting to the EPA would initially involve high costs in several areas including trade facilitation, regulatory mechanisms and institutional frameworks, certification processes and fiscal adjustments.
However she said that the accord provides “an opportunity for us to sell our goods and services outside the region, thus increasing our economic output”.
CMC/ad/ir/2012