ACP negotiating mandate for post-Cotonou partnership agreement with EU |04 June 2018

ACP Council of Ministers gives unanimous support

The ACP negotiating mandate for the post-Cotonou partnership agreement with the European Union (EU) was unanimously adopted at the 107th Session of the ACP Council of Ministers which took place in Lomé, Togo, on May 30.

Central to the discussions in Lomé were the revision of the Georgetown Agreement and the adoption of an ACP negotiating mandate for the post- Cotonou partnership agreement with the European Union.

The Council meetings were crucial to opening new negotiations with the EU in the quest for the attainment of sustainable development in all ACP (African Caribbean Pacific) countries.

Apart from the discussions on the future of the ACP Group and its relations with the European Union, the 107th Session of the ACP Council of Ministers addressed strategic matters such as repositioning the ACP group as a more effective global player in order to respond better to the needs and aspirations of its ACP member states.

Ambassador Barry Faure, secretary of state for Foreign Affairs in the department of Foreign Affairs, heading the Seychelles delegation, made a presentation to the special session on this subject.

Ministers also addressed ways of leveraging the principles of complementarity and subsidiarity between the ACP Group and the Regional and Continental organisations, sustaining financing of the Group and lastly advancing the climate change agenda in a repositioned ACP Group.

Other key items on the agenda included commodities & trade issues, sustainable economic development, and development finance.

In his interventions on these issues, Ambassador Faure wished for the inclusion of the fisheries sector to be featured under the Ministerial Consultation on Commodities given the importance of fisheries sector to Seychelles.

He called on the member states to sign the instruments for the Joint Undertaking on the Customs Cooperation Agreement with the objective of increasing intra-ACP partnership and deepening integration.

To note that only 13 countries, including Seychelles, out of the 79 have signed this agreement.

The 107th Session of the ACP Council of Ministers was followed by the 43rd Session of the ACP - EU Council of Ministers.

The Council noted with satisfaction the adoption by the ACP of its negotiating mandate for the post-Cotonou partnership agreement and that the ACP was ready to start the negotiations.

The EU Council on its part informed the ACP member states that they were in the final stages of concluding their negotiating mandate for the post-Cotonou partnership agreement with the ACP Group of Countries.

Both sides noted with satisfaction the progress made and agreed to exchange before the end of June a memorandum on their respective mandates to formally launch the negotiations in August.

Several other important issues were discussed, and views exchanged, during the  two-day meeting under specific thematic themes including: climate change (on which a Joint Declaration was adopted), migration, development finance cooperation and the European external investment plan, trade cooperation, the situation of middle income countries, exploitation of natural resources and vulnerability and disaster risk reduction.

In his intervention, Ambassador Faure firmly expressed the need to engage with the Bretton Woods institutions and OECD states to review the criteria for allocating official development assistance (ODA).

He stressed that a composite formula should be adopted that looks beyond the conventional norm of GDP per capita.

Ambassador Faure reiterated the need for a multi-dimensional approach to be adopted  and called for the ACP and EU to agree to jointly work on this particular subject to ensure that the criteria is urgently changed.

Also in attendance from Seychelles at these meetings were our Brussels-based Ambassador Beryl Samson and second secretary Marco Larsen.