General Secretariat of the African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States.

Joint ACP-EC press release
Brussels, 2 October 2003

ACP Council of Ministers and EU Commissioners adopt a Declaration and a Report on Phase 1 of negotiations of the Economic Partnership Agreements (EPA).

On 2 October 2003 the ACP (Africa, Caribbean and Pacific) Council of Ministers and EU Commissioners for Trade and Development gathered in Brussels for the 2nd ACP-EC Ministerial Meeting for the EPAs negotiations, adopt a Joint Declaration and a Joint Report on the progress of the negotiations. EPA negotiations were launched in September 2002 at the all-ACP – EU level. The two parties welcomed the points of convergence and noted the points of divergence. They decided that the declaration and the report shall serve as a point of reference and provide guidance for the negotiations at regional level, which will be launched in October 2003, with Central and Western Africa on 4 and 6 October, respectively. Both sides also agreed to work further together, notably with a view to ensure transparency and coherence of the overall negotiations process. On Cancun, both sides regretted that the meeting ended without consensus and discussed the way forward.

In particular, the ACP and the EU agreed that EPAs must be instruments for development, promoting sustainable development of ACP countries, their smooth and gradual integration into the global economy and eradication of poverty. Therefore, EPAs will take account of the specific economic, social, environmental and structural constraints of the ACP countries and regions concerned.

Both sides stressed that regional integration is of crucial importance as a step towards the development of the ACP countries. EPAs will therefore support existing regional integration initiatives within the ACP and will be based on the integration objectives of the regions concerned. EPAs will improve the current level of preferential market access which ACP exports enjoy into the EC. EPAs therefore need to be mainstreamed into the development policies of the ACP countries and regions and fully integrated into the development cooperation policies of the European Union.

As regards the Fifth WTO Ministerial Meeting at Cancun, both sides regretted that the meeting ended without consensus. They deplored, in particular, that crucial and directly development-related topics such as agriculture and cotton could not be properly discussed during the meeting. As in Cancun, the EC reiterates its readiness to address the trade aspects of the African cotton initiative. Both sides agree that it would be possible, within a comprehensive package including implementation issues and satisfactory solutions for agriculture and in particular cotton, to define modalities for the pursuit of the Doha negotiations in a balanced manner covering all issues. They agreed to consult on how to move the process forward.

contact :

ACP : Hegel Goutier, Tel. 02 743 0604

EU : Arancha Gonzalez, Tel. 02 296 1553