African nations to sign parts of EU trade deal
Reuters | 1 Aug 2007
African nations to sign parts of EU trade deal
NAIROBI, Aug 1 (Reuters) — The European Union and east African countries thrashing out a new but contentious trade deal will sign parts of it by a Dec. 31 deadline even if all is not ready by then, a Kenyan trade official said on Wednesday.
The accord must be in place by the end of this year, when a World Trade Organisation exemption on preferential EU market access for African, Caribbean and Pacific countries expires.
"If we have finished 70 percent of it, we will put that on the table and sign it," said David Nalo, permanent secretary in Kenya’s Trade and Industry Ministry.
"Whatever is remaining, we will negotiate and engage with the EU on how we deal with parts that are not concluded."
Kenya and 15 other nations in eastern and southern Africa are negotiating the new deal with the EU — an Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) — as a bloc to protect their fledgling farm sectors and industries.
Nalo said the EU had assured the African nations that trade in agricultural commodities would not be disrupted during a transition period after the deadline lapses.
"The most important thing that we must do is to ensure that the transition process is such that we don’t disrupt trade," he told reporters on a Reuters Foundation journalism course.
The EPAs give the countries preferential EU trade access and are intended eventually to lead to full trade liberalisation. They demand poor nations progressively open their markets to European products.
The EU is also in talks with five other similar regional groups made up of former colonies of some of its members.
