Why give up our markets for subsidised EU goods?
October 14, 2009
By Inter Press Service
Why should we surrender ourselves to the invasion of highly subsidised European goods? What will be the effect of capital outflows because of strategic services such as telecoms, port, energy and water services liberalised and privatised in the interest of European companies?
These are the questions that Rezistans ek Alternativ, a Mauritian political movement, wants answers to after its country's government, along with Madagascar, Seychelles and Zimbabwe, signed an interim economic partnership agreement (EPA) with the EU last month.
They appealed for an urgent session of the parliament to be held to debate the deal.
"Those who will benefit substantially from this deal are not those who'll shoulder its consequences," said Roody Muneean and Ashok Subron, members of the movement.
They argued that technocrats and politicians had not learnt past lessons, referring to World Trade Organisation deals signed hastily, with harmful results for many developing countries' people. They deplored the exclusion of the trade union movement, small-scale producers and industries, fishers, consumer bodies and other citizen groups from the negotiating process.
"The market access given to ESA (eastern and southern Africa) countries is nothing more than the further locking of African economies into the neo-colonial export-led strategy, based on cheap labour and degrading working conditions for our people," said Rezistans ek Alternativ.
Muneean and Subron see the EPA not as a development tool for Africa, but as a profit-generating mechanism for European companies and some local interests.
But those who signed the deal put a different spin on it. International Trade Minister of Mauritius - Arvin Boolell - one of the promoters of the deal, said the island state wanted to use the deal to swell trade, promote diversification, attract European investments and urge technology transfer.
"We must constantly wage war against poverty," he said. "Improving the lives of our populations expands the circle of opportunities for everybody."
Sindiso Ngwenya, the secretary-general at the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa), justified the EPA by indicating that the EU collectively represented 27 countries.
"These countries are not only the most key trading partners for the Comesa region, accounting for (up to) 40 percent of trade turnover, but they are key partners to the region, providing essential development finance in the form of loans and grants through various channels," he observed.
Zambia's Minister of Industry and Commerce Felix Mutati said there should be "no debate on words, please". "The challenge for the sugar farmers in Mauritius, the vegetable growers in Zimbabwe and the honey-hunters in Zambia being bitten by bees but continuing to harvest honey - who all need to put food on the table - is to know how they can connect to the EU.
"If we can provide some relief to these people in the field whose lives are only about pure survival, the EPA would have achieved something," he observed.
However, his country did not sign the deal despite leading the ESA group of 16 African countries.
Mutati said: "In the African tradition, the father does not eat first." Later he added that Zambia would sign the full EPA scheduled for this month. The Zambian minister was all set to canvass the other ESA states that have remained outside of the process to get inside the tent.
He beckoned EU firms to Africa as the continent had abandoned bad governance, including instability in economic management and dysfunctional institutions.
The EPA replaces all previous trade agreements between the EU and the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries and is meant to support their development, strengthen regional integration and provide for special and differential protection of vulnerable ACP markets.
Under the deal, the signatory states can export all goods except sugar and rice to the EU free-duty and quota. For textiles and clothing, the EU offers the single transformation rule of origin, allowing enterprises in ESA signatory states to source fabrics globally, transform them and export to its markets duty- and quota-free.
This new deal moves away from the traditional, non-preferential trade ties between the ACP's 77 developing countries and the EU as it is based on reciprocity.
Thus, ESA states will liberalise 80 percent of imports from Europe over 15 years, with an initial five-year preparation.
After this time, 20 percent of trade will remain excluded from any liberalisation.
Sunil Boodhoo, the deputy director at the trade policy unit in Mauritius, said there was "no compulsion" to sign the EPA. "Any country is free to sign, but one should measure the consequences for an island such as Mauritius that is not a least-developed country and does not benefit from the Everything But Arms trade initiative (for least-developed countries)."
If tomorrow, one of the local industries was detrimentally affected by imports from EU countries, Mauritius could always put safeguards in place. "This is the case for any African country," he observed.
The EPAs are being signed with the EU in seven regions of the world. So far, 26 out of the 36 countries have signed this trade deal that will change the trade, economic and investment relationship between the EU and ACP countries. - Inter Press Service
|
|
