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The discussions will be observed with particular interest to see what approach Karel de Gucht, the EU's new trade commissioner, will adopt.
He recently took over the position from Catherine Ashton who, thanks to a more conciliatory strategy, was able to make greater progress with the EPAs than her predecessor, Peter Mandelson.
Mandelson had been labelled as "prescriptive", "arrogant" and "inflexible", having caused considerable damage to relations between the EU and its former colonies.
No easy task awaits De Gucht. The EPA agreements between the EU and its former colonies in Africa, the Caribbean and Pacific Group of States (the ACP countries) should have been in place by December 2007, when the Cotonou Agreement lapsed. Cotonou offered the country very favourable market access to the EU, without which those countries economies would have been put under tremendous pressure.
In terms of Cotonou any replacement agreement should ensure that the ACP countries are not worse off than before - a stipulation simply ignored by Mandelson, says a trade policy expert. The ACP countries are "highly dependent" on preferential access to the EU, which means that the EPAs are regarded as the price of continued exporting to the EU. But at what cost?
The EU is accused of leaving the ACP countries with precious little room for negotiation and of hampering regional integration in Africa because different rules obtain for different countries. The scope of ACP countries' policies is also reduced by EU restrictions on, for instance, export duties and the protection of new industries.
In addition the EU insists that signatories also offer it any favourable trading conditions extended to other large trading countries, such as China, India and Brazil.
South Africa, which does not receive the same market access to the EU as other southern Africa Customs union member countries, seriously opposes this because it restricts its ability to negotiate with other players.
A senior EU official says negotiations with African countries are complex because of the variety of regional bodies, such as the Southern African Development Community, the East African Community and the Common Market of Eastern and Southern Africa - and countries that are members of more than one of these bodies.
Moreover, various strategies obtain for developing these regions to economic communities and eventually to a uniform African community similar to the EU.
Much of the criticism levelled at the EU is therefore that it negotiates different EPAs with different regions, impeding the planned process of integration.
It is very, very difficult to understand the future plans of the various regions, said the official.
- Sake24.com
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