THREE NEW EU agreements with Africa will help developing countries benefit from a changed international trading regime, Minister of State for Overseas Development Peter Power has said.
“Whether we like it or not we live in an era of globalisation,” Mr Power told the Dáil, which backed the agreements replacing previous deals favouring 77 African, Caribbean and Pacific countries.
There had to be change because many other countries were excluded from the previous deals and that was “unfair and illegal”.
Defending the new agreements, he said the “least developed countries have not benefited from the international trading regime.”
Development aid “is vital for developing countries” but by itself “will never assist these countries in rising out of poverty”. The only way to ultimately do so was by “ensuring they become involved in the international trading regime”.
Labour foreign affairs spokesman Michael D Higgins, who insisted the agreements be debated in a plenary Dáil session, said the House should not back the agreements until “there had been signature for the African side”.
The European Parliament had also not discussed it and that was important particularly in considering “the connection between trade and development”.
Mr Higgins said a number of African countries had “expressed reservations” based on “fundamentals” including reductions on tariffs and new clauses on “extractive industries”.
East African countries had also asked “ministers not to sign until these issues have been resolved”.
Sinn Féin foreign affairs spokesman Aengus Ó Snodaigh warned that these agreements were not to the benefit of ordinary Africans but for the EU.
“Whenever we are dealing with African countries we should always remember that EU member states were in charge of those countries when they had colonies” and he was “concerned” that the agenda was being put forward by “countries which lost their colonies. “We must be certain we aren’t protecting small districts at the expense of the development of regions in their entirety, he said.”
