EU tactics over African trade are ’bribery’, say aid groups
The Guardian (Londond) | Friday December 8, 2006
EU tactics over African trade are ’bribery’, say aid groups
Larry Elliott, economics editor and Angela Balakrishnan
The European Union is insisting that some of Africa’s poorest countries accept liberalisation of services, investment and competition policy as the price of better access to the world’s richest market, it emerged last night.
Under proposals being discussed in Brussels today, the European commission will say that unless the developing nations accept changes in sectors deemed too sensitive to be included in global trade talks, they will be denied better market access for their exports.
Aid agencies said a document, seen by the Guardian, outlining the proposed tough negotiating stance over an economic partnership area (EPA) with South Africa and seven other countries in sub-Saharan Africa amounted to "bribery".
Both Brussels and Washington have started to push for bilateral and regional deals since the stalling of the Doha round of trade liberalisation talks, normally insisting on far more stringent conditions than proved possible in the multilateral World Trade Organisation talks.
Matt Griffith, of the aid agency CAFOD, called on the UK — which has said poor countries should decide for themselves whether to negotiate in sectors such as investment and competition policy — to "stamp" on the proposals.
The EC paper reveals Brussels will impose tougher conditions on South Africa than the seven other African states — Botswana, Mozambique, Tanzania, Namibia, Swaziland, Lesotho and Angola — because it has a more competitive economy and poses a more serious threat to Europe’s interests. Offering the same terms to South Africa would be "detrimental to some of the EC’s most sensitive sectors," it says.
African countries have been trying to improve their access to Europe’s markets, but Brussels said it was not "an acceptable option" to do this without including "supply-side commitments (eg services, investment, government procurement, trade facilitation, intellectual property rights, environment, labour and competition).
"These issues are the essence of the EPA sustainable development package. It should also be made clear that if, in the end, the region would choose not to make an effort in addressing those issues, then the EC would find it difficult to improve access to its market."
Mr Griffith said: "This is mercantilism par excellence. The commission is seeking to use desperately needed market access into the European Union to bribe African countries into accepting trade rules that would be against their interests, and which African countries have already explicitly rejected."
