Delivering on Promises? The Expected Impacts and Implementation Challenges of the Economic Partnership Agreements Between the European Union and Africa

Delivering on Promises? The Expected Impacts and Implementation Challenges of the Economic Partnership Agreements Between the European Union and Africa PDF Author: Bernhard Tröster
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Economic partnership agreements (EPAs) mark a new era in economic relations between the European Union and African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries that will lead to reciprocal tariff liberalization. Model-based impact assessments have become a powerful tool in trade negotiations and mixed results are reported for ACP countries. Given their set-up within a neoclassical framework, these models neglect important issues such as impacts on employment, macroeconomic balances and adjustment costs. The structuralist computable general equilibrium model applied in this article for three African EPA regions addresses these shortcomings and shows negative macroeconomic and distributional effects and important adjustment costs associated with employment and public revenue losses. These results highlight the importance of policy responses to deliver on promises associated with EPAs, namely sustainable economic development. More generally, they show the importance of alternative models to understand implementation challenges and facilitate broader debates about bilateral trade agreements.

Delivering on Promises? The Expected Impacts and Implementation Challenges of the Economic Partnership Agreements Between the European Union and Africa

Delivering on Promises? The Expected Impacts and Implementation Challenges of the Economic Partnership Agreements Between the European Union and Africa PDF Author: Bernhard Tröster
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Economic partnership agreements (EPAs) mark a new era in economic relations between the European Union and African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries that will lead to reciprocal tariff liberalization. Model-based impact assessments have become a powerful tool in trade negotiations and mixed results are reported for ACP countries. Given their set-up within a neoclassical framework, these models neglect important issues such as impacts on employment, macroeconomic balances and adjustment costs. The structuralist computable general equilibrium model applied in this article for three African EPA regions addresses these shortcomings and shows negative macroeconomic and distributional effects and important adjustment costs associated with employment and public revenue losses. These results highlight the importance of policy responses to deliver on promises associated with EPAs, namely sustainable economic development. More generally, they show the importance of alternative models to understand implementation challenges and facilitate broader debates about bilateral trade agreements.

The European Union–West Africa Economic Partnership Agreement

The European Union–West Africa Economic Partnership Agreement PDF Author: Bouët, Antoine
Publisher: Intl Food Policy Res Inst
ISBN:
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 80

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Book Description
Despite recent modifications, the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) between the European Union (EU) and West African (WA) countries is still being criticized for its potential detrimental effects on WA countries. This paper provides updated evidence on the impact of the EPA on these countries. A dynamic multicountry, multisector computable general equilibrium trade model with modeling of the dual-dual economy and with a consistent tariff aggregator is used to simulate a series of new scenarios that include updated information on the agreement. We also go beyond estimating macrolevel economic effects to analyze the impacts on poverty. The policy simulation results show that the implementation of the EPA between the EU and WA countries would have marginal but positive impacts on Burkina Faso and Côte d’Ivoire and negative impacts on Benin, Ghana, Nigeria, Senegal, and Togo. The impact on poverty indicators in Ghana and Nigeria would be marginal. From the perspective of WA countries, this study supports the view that recent EU concessions are not sufficient and that domestic fiscal reforms are needed in WA countries themselves.

Beyond Market Access for Economic Development

Beyond Market Access for Economic Development PDF Author: Gerrit Faber
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 113401578X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 440

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Book Description
The Economic Partnership Agreements between the European Union and the Africa, Caribbean, and Pacific (ACP) countries have drastically restructured Europe’s trade architecture towards the third world. This volume examines the consequences of EPAs for development in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Starting from the observation that the establishment of free trade as such will substantially impact upon economic development, the different contributions focus on the potential contribution of non-traditional aspects of EPAs. More specifically, the authors analyze the role of Aid for Trade schemes, regulatory integration issues and broader foreign policy considerations. How can these non-market access aspects stimulate development in Africa, and how have they been addressed in the EPAs? In short, this brings us to the question whether the ‘light version EPAs’ as they currently stand are a missed chance or a blessing in disguise?

Economic Partnership Agreements and the Export Competitiveness of Africa

Economic Partnership Agreements and the Export Competitiveness of Africa PDF Author: Paul Brenton
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN:
Category : Commercial policy
Languages : en
Pages : 29

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Book Description
Abstract: Trade can be a key driver of growth for African countries, as it has been for those countries, particularly in East Asia, that have experienced high and sustained rates of growth. Economic partnership agreements with the European Union could be instrumental in a competitiveness framework, but to do so they would have to be designed carefully in a way that supports integration into the global economy and is consistent with national development strategies. Interim agreements have focused on reciprocal tariff removal and less restrictive rules of origin. To be fully effective, economic partnership agreements will have to address constraints to regional integration, including both tariff and non-tariff barriers; improve trade facilitation; and define appropriate most favored nation services liberalization. At the same time, African countries will need to reduce external tariff peak barriers on a most favored nation basis to ensure that when preferences for the European Union are implemented after transitional periods, they do not lead to substantial losses from trade diversion. This entails an ambitious agenda of policy reform that must be backed up by development assistance in the form of "aid for trade."

Trade Relations Between the EU and Africa

Trade Relations Between the EU and Africa PDF Author: Yenkong Ngangjoh-Hodu
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135193509
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 320

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Book Description
This timely volume advances an alternative set of inter-related, interdisciplinary perspectives and debates which contribute to overlapping genres and discourses on development economics and trade relations between the EU and Africa.

Did you say free trade ?

Did you say free trade ? PDF Author: Berthelot jacques
Publisher: Editions L'Harmattan
ISBN: 214010045X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : fr
Pages : 146

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Book Description
The headlong rush of the European Union (EU) in Free Trade Agreements reaches the paroxysm of absurdity when it imposes them on West Africa, whose per capita GDP is 21 times lower than its own. This Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) would make West Africa lose 76% of its customs revenue on its imports from the EU and lead to a sharp rise in unemployment due to the loss of competitiveness of its companies including the informal sectors.The latter will be worsened by the premature signing, with support from the EU, of the Continental Free Trade Area by 13 of 16 West African States, all this based on a number of untruths from the European Commission, as identified in this book.

Africa

Africa PDF Author: Weltbank
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
This report addresses the question raised in its title - now that 18 interim Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) have been initialed and negotiations of full EPAs have been launched, what should African countries and regional EPA-groups do? Part two of the report analyzes the outcome of the EPA negotiations thus far, the interim EPAs' implications for the trade and related policies of participating African countries, and the reforms required for successful implementation of interim EPAs. Part three examines the potential role of full EPAs, in advancing regional trade integration, open trade policies, and the liberalization of trade in services and foreign direct investment in Africa. The intended audience for this report is primarily policy makers and their advisors in the African EPA-countries, but it may also be of interest to those in the broader development community concerned with Africa.

Europe and Africa

Europe and Africa PDF Author: Giovanni Carbone
Publisher: Ledizioni
ISBN: 8855265946
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 128

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Book Description
A year and a half after the new Strategy with Africa proposed by the European Commission was made public, the new partnership between the two continents is still being defined. The impact of the Covid-19 pandemic with Africa’s first economic recession in 25 years and a sharp rise in poverty and debt has created new challenges for the two continents’ agenda, highlighting new gaps to address on the way forward.With the European Union-African Union summit scheduled for February 2022, the definition of the new partnership is once again gathering momentum, while both sides are still trying to define common positions. Will these two “natural partners” be able to tackle the most urgent challenges and turn them into opportunities for collaboration and engagement? What are the priority issues, and which ones are potentially most divisive?

The Interim Economic Partnership Agreements between the EU and African States : contents, challenges and prospects

The Interim Economic Partnership Agreements between the EU and African States : contents, challenges and prospects PDF Author: European Centre for Development Policy Management
Publisher:
ISBN: 9789072908407
Category : Africa
Languages : en
Pages : 310

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Book Description


Economic Partnership Agreements Between Sub-Saharan Africa and the EU

Economic Partnership Agreements Between Sub-Saharan Africa and the EU PDF Author: Lawrence E. Hinkle
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
This paper draws on Hinkle and Schiff (2003). It analyses the planned Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) between the EU and Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) from a development perspective. It does not take a position on whether SSA should enter into EPAs with the EU. Rather, it starts from the notion that the process of forming EPAs is unlikely to be reversed and examines the conditions that will maximise SSA's benefits from the EPAs. If this notion is correct, then the analysis presented in the paper applies. On the other hand, Pascal Lamy, the EU Trade Commissioner, made a proposal at the May 2004 G-90 summit in Dakar that might lead to a change in the EPA process. He proposed that the G-90, a group consisting of ACP and non-ACP LDC countries, should not have to make concessions at the WTO Doha Round of multilateral trade negotiations, i.e., he proposed a 'free round' for the G-90. This proposal opens the door to the possibility that the same might apply to the ACP countries in the EU-ACP negotiations and that the EPA process might be reversed. The paper considers the key issues raised by the planned EPAs, their relationship to the WTO's Doha Round and the EU's Everything-but-Arms Initiative, the changes needed to make the EPAs internally consistent, the domestic reforms in SSA that would need to accompany trade liberalisation in both goods and services, and the potential effects of the EPAs on regional integration in SSA. The EPAs will pose a number of policy challenges for SSA countries, including: restructuring of indirect tax systems, reduction of MFN tariffs, liberalisation of service imports on an MFN basis and related regulatory reforms in the services sector, and liberalisation of trade in both goods and services within the regional trading blocs in SSA. The paper also finds that the EPAs provide an opportunity to accelerate regional and global trade integration in SSA. To realise the potential development benefits of the planned EPAs, two steps are essential. First, the EU must, as it has stated, truly treat the EPAs as instruments of development, subordinating its commercial interests in the agreements to the development needs of SSA. Second, the SSA countries need to implement a number of EPA-related trade policy reforms. However, the latter is far from certain, given the lack of reform momentum in SSA.