Brussels, 07/05/2015 (Agence Europe) - On the sidelines of the European trade ministers' meeting on Thursday 7 May, France's secretary of state for trade, Matthias Fekl, bemoaned “the largely insufficient progress” on transparency, geographical indications (GI) and public procurement in the negotiations for a transatlantic trade and investment partnership agreement (TTIP).
Latvia's trade minister, Edgars Rinkevics, told press at the end of the meeting, that in taking stock of the TTIP negotiations on Thursday, the European trade ministers “encouraged the European Commission to keep up its efforts on achieving progress on each of the three pillars of the negotiation” - market access, regulatory convergence and rules. Rinkevics added that the Council also reiterated its call for increased transparency and increased access to documents.
Asked about the lack of progress on GI and public procurement, European Commissioner for Trade Cecilia Malmström said she hoped the draft legislation - the Trade Promotion Authority - on granting increased powers to the US president to conclude trade agreements as part of the Fast Track procedure would be adopted in autumn 2015 so as to give US negotiators a basis for negotiation. “As regards GI, we have an excellent agreement with Canada and we expect the same thing with the US. As regards public procurement, we expect wider access to US public procurement - but these discussions have not yet started and I hope we can find creative solutions by the autumn”, Malmström said.
The last session of technical level talks (the ninth session, in New York on 20-24 April) enabled new progress ahead of the political level review in the autumn (see EUROPE 11302). A tenth round of talks is planned in Brussels in July - before the summer holiday.
At the end of the last session with US Trade Representative Mike Froman, in Washington on 4 May, Malmström hailed a “good mutual understanding” of the current state of the discussions and a “common desire to move forward”.
On the EU side, the European Council called in March for “the utmost to be done” to conclude a TTIP agreement that is “ambitious, comprehensive and mutually beneficial by the end of 2015”. The Latvian Presidency of the EU Council of Ministers and the European Commission are nevertheless more cautious about the timetable. Malmström has said she hopes a principle agreement on the TTIP skeleton can be reached by the end of 2015. In the meantime, the European Parliament - which will have to ratify the agreement - is due to adopt its recommendations in June. (Emmanuel Hagry)