NOTE General Secretariat of the Council Delegations Meeting of the European Parliament Committee on International Trade, Brussels, 10 December 2009

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1 COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN UNION Brussels, 16 December /09 PE 395 RELEX 1214 COMER 197 NOTE from: to: Subject: General Secretariat of the Council Delegations Meeting of the European Parliament Committee on International Trade, Brussels, 10 December 2009 The meeting was chaired by Mr MOREIRA (S&D/P) 1. Presentation by Ewa Björling, Minister for Trade of the Swedish Government, representing the President-in-Office of the Council, on the achievements of the Swedish Presidency in the area of International Trade Policy The Minister informed the Committee that, in spite of the fragile economic recovery, jobs were still being lost and this could aggravate the risk of protectionism. The Presidency's priority had therefore been to keep markets open and to confirm the EU's leading role in the fight against protectionist measures. Since Ms Björling considered multilateral agreements to be preferable to bilateral ones, she said that persuading key trade partners to make formal commitments on the conclusion of the DOHA round had also been a top priority for the Presidency /09 LDH/nr 1

2 She listed the Free Trade agreement with Korea, the progress in negotiations with Armenia, Georgia, Russia, India, Peru, Colombia, Central America, Canada, the Transatlantic Economic Council, Euromed and ACTA and the conclusion of some new EPAs as further achievements of the Swedish Presidency and she drew attention to the successful Conferences on "Corporate Social responsibility" and "Trade and climate change". The Chair, Mr THEURER (EPP/DE), Mr KAZAK (EPP/BG), Mr LANGE (S&D/DE), Mr ARIF (S&D/F), Mr MARTIN (S&D/UK), Mr SCHOLZ (GUEL/DE) and Ms MUNIZ (S&D/ES) asked about progress in the DOHA round, the FTA with Korea and its effect on the European car industry, Russian membership of the WTO, pharmaceutical patents, social rights in Colombia, the impact of the Lisbon Treaty on the role of the European Parliament, the conclusion of further EPAs and development aid. Ms BJÖRLING said that the outlook on the conclusions of the DOHA round was improving since most WTO member states seemed to be in favour of a quick resolution. She considered that the FTA with Korea should be judged on its overall merits. She said that the crisis in the car industry was a structural one which would not be significantly affected by the FTA and that the agreement contained strong safeguard clauses which could be triggered unilaterally by the EU. The Minister emphasised that Russian and Montenegran membership of the WTO was very much supported by the EU, that bilateral agreements should not undermine TRIPS, that the situation on human rights in Colombia remained worrying but that continuing the dialogue would offer the best possibility of increasing pressure, that aid for trade was indeed high on the agenda of the EU and that important commitments had already been made in this area, and that EPAs included strong regional integration measures. She said that she considered that practical arrangements to enhance the role of the European Parliament following the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty would be necessary. 2. Agreement on trade in bananas between the EU and MFN banana suppliers Exchange of views with David O'Sullivan, Director-General, DG Trade, Commission 17624/09 LDH/nr 2

3 Mr O'SULLIVAN announced that an agreement on this longstanding issue was within reach. Since the EU had lost some WTO cases and was obviously not in legal compliance, a solution needed. This would involve giving bananas special treatment by excluding them from the list of other tropical products, and by tackling the erosion of preferential treatment of ACP and Latin American countries over a long period. Following agreement with the countries concerned, the USA would also approve the deal shortly and the text would then be formally presented to the WTO General Council. This text, which Mr O'SULLIVAN said was one of extreme legal complexity, would then be transformed into an international agreement to be submitted to the Council and the European Parliament. Ms BOZKURT (S&D/NL), Mr MARTIN, Mr ARIF, Mr DESIR (S&D/F) and Mr SCHOLZ asked questions about the consequences of the agreement for producers, consumers, and EPAs/FTA, about accompanying measures and about the list of tropical products. The Director-General replied that there was provision for financial support to mitigate the effect of the preference erosion, that all ACP and Latin American countries were indeed in agreement, that each EPA or FTA had to be judged on its own merits, and that the list of tropical products was now stable and would be integrated into the Doha agricultural acquis. 3. The effects of the global financial and economic crisis on developing countries and on development cooperation INTA/7/ /2150(INI) COM(2009)0160 Exchange of views The rapporteur, Ms MUNIZ, underlined, on the basis of concrete statistics, that developing countries were hit more severely by the crisis than the industrialised countries. The main reasons for this, she said, were the significant decrease in the price of raw materials, the reduction of financial flows to developing countries and the growth in external debt /09 LDH/nr 3

4 She advocated increasing policy coherence, the maintenance of trade assistance measures, discussions between the EU and international financial institutions and the promotion of South-South development. A representative of the Commission said that last April the Commission had submitted a communication on the issue which was endorsed by the Council and had resulted in the establishment of an ad hoc financial instrument. The first instalment of payments from these funds would be paid before the end of the year and additional support would be provided for infrastructure. A draft report would be prepared for discussion on 27 January EU Policy Coherence for Development and the Official Development Assistance plus concept (ODA+) Exchange of views The rapporteur, Mr HIGGINS (GUEL/IRL), stated that the reality of EU trade policy showed little coherence with the objectives of EU development aid and was sometimes even in conflict with them. He announced that his forthcoming report would provide evidence of this on the basis of concrete examples. Representatives of the Commission informed the Committee that the Treaty itself provided for a coherence obligation and that 12 areas, including trade, had already been identified in 2005 as requiring coherence with other policy areas. In the 2009 report on coherence, the trade chapter was by far the most thorough, and a new Communication recently endorsed by the Council introduced a more proactive coherence approach to making trade more development-friendly, inter alia. In view of the time constraint, the Chair decided to defer further discussions until the draft report was available /09 LDH/nr 4

5 5. Next meetings Thursday 14 January 2010, Wednesday 27 January 2010, and /09 LDH/nr 5