WRITTEN QUESTION No. 22/99 by Glenys KINNOCK Effects of exports in sensitive sectors
Date: 1999-01-19
Institutions: European Parliament, KINNOCK
Subjects: ACP countries, EU market, Lomé Convention, World Trade Organisation, export, fishery product, generalised preferences, market access, tariff exemption













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91999E0022

WRITTEN QUESTION No. 22/99 by Glenys KINNOCK Effects of exports in sensitive sectors  


Official Journal C 325 , 12/11/1999 P. 0058 





WRITTEN QUESTION E-0022/99by Glenys Kinnock (PSE) to the Commission(19 January 1999)Subject: Effects of exports in sensitive sectorsIn view of the EU suggestion that non-LDC ACP States should be offered the option of accepting GSP, does the Commission appreciate that some ACP States exporting into sensitive sectors such as fisheries would suffer a decline in relative preference?If such a GSP offered to non-LDC ACP States excluded highly-competitive developing country exporters such as Thailand, would there not be a likelihood of a challenge being issued in the WTO?Answer given by Mr Pinheiro on behalf of the Commission(9 March 1999)Under the Community scheme of generalised preference (GSP) market access conditions presently offered are indeed less advantageous than those granted under the Lomé Convention. This does include fisheries products for which African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries benefit from duty free access whereas non-least developed country (LDC) GSP countries face relatively high tariffs. Application of the GSP to ACP countries will lead indeed to a loss of preferential margin and therefore might have a negative impact on their level of exports in sectors where they have still to improve their competitiveness.On the contrary, economic partnership agreements, as proposed by the Community, would allow the non-LDC ACP not only to maintain but even to improve market access to the Community. For those ACP countries which, for objective reasons, are not in a position to join such an agreement, the Commission would remind the Honourable Member that in the framework of the negotiating directives, the Community undertook to examine all the alternative possibilities in order to provide these countries with a new framework for trade between them and the Community which is equivalent to their existing situation under the Lomé Convention and in conformity with World trade organisation (WTO) rules. In particular, the Community will take into account their interests in the review of the GSP in 2004, making use of the differentiation permitted under WTO rules.Present WTO rules do not allow discriminatory differentiation within the GSP in favour of a particular group of countries, with the exception of LDCs, 39 of them being ACP. However, a discussion of the adequacy of these rules in the light of the evolution of the international context and development policies could be foreseen in the future.The exclusion of Thailand from the preferential benefits of GSP for the fishery sector is a result of the application of the so-called graduation mechanism, which excludes sectors and countries from the benefit of the preferential margin if a certain level of development has been reached in that sector. This mechanism, which is applicable on the basis of non-discriminatory criteria to all benefiting countries, has so far never been challenged in WTO.