South Centre participates in Roundtable on "Technical Analysis of Development Implications of Draft EPA Provisions"

Luisa Rodriguez, Trade for Development Programme, made a presentation at the Roundtable entitled “What’s on the table for development? A Technical analysis of development implications of draft EPA provisions”, held in Brussels on 13 September 2007.

The presentation made by Luisa Rodriguez assessed the content of the EPA texts on the basis of existing vulnerabilities of the agriculture sector in ACP countries. These vulnerabilities include: supply side constraints; dependency on a limited number of commodities, markets and preferential market access; increased frequency and extent of import surges. She made specific recommendations concerning: the process leading to regional selection of Sensitive Products, technical and financial needs to reinforce and develop ACP countries’ capacities with regards to health and sanitary standards and an agricultural safeguard mechanism.

This event was jointly organized by APRODEV and Christian Aid to help ACP and EU officials to better understand the development implications of EPA texts, in order to enable them to make a knowledgeable assessment of whether these texts will deliver the development ambitions of Cotonou or what needs to change before decisions on signing are made in December. Representatives of the EU member states, ACP representatives in Brussels and civil society organizations and think tanks participated in this event.