Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-03-14-Speech-2-196"
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"en.20000314.10.2-196"2
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"The European Community initiative intended to offer free access to the markets of industrialised countries, and the most advanced developing countries, to essentially all products of the least developed countries, was launched as part of the process which led to the Seattle Conference. The initiative was drawn up immediately after the Singapore Conference, when the Council invited the Commission to make proposals in favour of the least developed countries, both for immediate action and additional medium-term action. In its conclusions dating from June 1997, the Council made reference to the expression: ‘essentially all the products of LLDCs’.
Regarding the immediate measures, in the GSP regulation at the end of 1998, the Community established, for all least developed countries, a system equivalent to that of the Lomé Convention, as the Council had requested. In 1999, as part of the post-Lomé negotiations, the Council, among other things, specified what it intended to do regarding market access for LLDCs and decided that the Community should, in the year 2000, commence a process which, by the end of the multilateral trade negotiations and by the year 2005 at the latest, will enable free access for essentially all LLDC products, based on the trade system existing under the Lomé Convention. The difference between all and essentially all products affects, as we well know, a number of specific agricultural products.
This is the mandate which the Commission was given and therefore, naturally, we must respect it. My own services are currently preparing proposals which will be presented to the Council when they are completely ready.
At the same time, the Community, in its ‘least developed countries’ initiative within the framework of the WTO, seeks to associate other commercial partners to this market opening policy of ours, which would consist of exempting essentially all the products of LLDCs from duties and quotas. This initiative is intended, if I may say so, to kick-start our own proposal which, combined with what we can achieve with other parties, would enable the least developed countries to sell their products, in virtually total freedom, on a large number of markets other than our own. I am thinking particularly of the markets of the developed countries: the United States, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand. I am also thinking, possibly, of a number of emerging countries, already industrialised. At the moment I am making great efforts to move forward this initiative which we have included in the rescue package which we are working on in Geneva. That is the state of play at the present time.
As the questioner indicates, we should ask whether the restriction associated with the expression ‘essentially all products’ may be retained for very much longer as soon as we consider granting these countries total access to our markets. As far as the Community is concerned, following the signature of a new agreement with the ACP countries which no longer includes the obligation to offer equal access for all ACP countries, we could in fact start thinking about more extensive liberalisation of access to our markets in favour of the least developed countries. I should not, however, wish to start thinking about this until our present initiative regarding essentially all products has reached a sufficiently advanced and credible stage, following talks with our commercial partners, to be able to move on to the next stage.
I should specify, finally, that access to the market is not the only requirement for countries that, occasionally, do not have a sufficient export capacity for internal reasons, be they distribution, logistical or transportation capacities. It is therefore necessary to look at what is termed ‘capacity building’, i.e. technical assistance measures to be implemented in order to ensure that this access is tangible and not just theoretical. This is the response I wished to give to this question which looks to the future."@en1
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