Pacific PACER-Plus trade talks continue
27 January 2013
From 29 to 30 November 2012, the fifth meeting of officials of the PACER-Plus trade negotiations took place. The Pacific Island Countries reiterated their position of May 2012, that ‘PACER-Plus should not result in a conventional free trade agreement’, and stressed the importance of including provisions that would ‘ensure sustainable growth and development of the Forum Island Countries’. Issues discussed at the meeting included SPS measures, technical barriers to trade, customs procedures, and rules of origin.
The meeting gave priority to finalising negotiations on trade in goods, including related development cooperation provisions. As in other negotiations, labour mobility is seen as an important issue for Pacific Island Countries (PICs). A further session is planned for April 2013 in Vanuatu.
Meanwhile, an opinion piece on the Islands Business website has argued that any granting of further concessions by the PICs in the EPA negotiations process would risk ‘setting a bad precedent for the PACER-Plus negotiations’.
Editorial comment
PIC governments are seeking a PACER-Plus agreement that goes beyond a ‘conventional free trade agreement’, to focus on development issues that matter to the PICs. This raises related questions of whether trade officials from Australian and New Zealand share with PIC officials a common understanding of what such a focus on development should entail, and whether they have available the necessary policy tools to be able to deliver on the provisions of a development-focused FTA arrangement.
It is clear from the experience of the interim EPA negotiations and Doha Development Agenda that development issues – how best to define and reflect them in the body of the agreement, and how to ensure the resources for their operational application – all need to be addressed at the start of the negotiations.
The pursuit of negotiations on the basis of strict interpretations of the provisions of Article XXIV of GATT and historical conventions is unlikely to provide an effective basis for securing the development-focused objectives sought by the PICs’ negotiators. These provisions and conventions lack the flexibility required to incorporate what may appear excessively flexible use of special and differential treatments. For example, if from the development perspective of PIC negotiators labour mobility is critical for the PICs, then there is no reason why this could not be negotiated first as part of trade in services or as a stand-alone part of PACER-Plus, before any negotiations on trade in goods.
Under the EPA, the majority of the PICs have submitted market access offers in their efforts to meet the requirements of ‘substantially all trade’. The extent to which PICs are prepared to open their markets can be gleaned from these offers. Both Australia and New Zealand will be seeking the same, or better. If negotiators fail to be flexible and do not sufficiently and effectively incorporate development issues into the provisions of PACER-Plus, then it is doubtful whether PACER-Plus will ever become the development tool that PIC negotiators are seeking.
