Under the chairmanship of their Estonian colleague Urve Palo in Brussels on Friday 10 November, the EU's trade ministers are to assess progress in the preparatory work for the 11th WTO ministerial conference in Buenos Aires in December, along with progress in the EU's free trade negotiations with Mercosur and Mexico.
WTO negotiations. The ministers will discuss the EU's priorities ahead of the 11th WTO ministerial conference in Buenos Aires on 10-13 December, with regard to possible deliverables and issues to be integrated into an ambitious WTO work programme to strengthen the organisation's role in the multilateral trade system. The EU has thus tabled ambitious proposals ahead of the WTO's decisions on reforming domestic support for agriculture (including the issue of public stockholdings for food security purposes) disciplines on harmful subsidies for fisheries, national regulation in services and e-commerce (see EUROPE 11879).
Mercosur. The Commission will inform the Council of progress in the talks for an EU-Mercosur (Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay) free trade agreement. A negotiation session took place in Brasilia this week (6-10 November). At the end of the previous negotiation session in early October, the parties affirmed their commitment to concluding an agreement in principle by the end of 2017, despite the revised offers exchanged in October being considered by both parties as insufficient (see EUROPE 11880).
Mexico. The Council will take stock of the negotiations to update the comprehensive EU-Mexico agreement of 2000. The fifth round of talks, at the end of September, enabled progress both on the text of the proposal of the trade section of the agreement and on the revised offers on market access, which were exchanged in July (see EUROPE 11880). The two parties maintain the objective of concluding an agreement in principle by the end of 2017. A sixth round of talks will take place in Mexico from 25 November to 1 December. "The negotiations are well advanced", a diplomatic source told EUROPE on Thursday 9 November, mentioning rules of origin, geographical indications, the opening of public procurement and the issue of investment protection as major key issues to be settled.
Japan. Over lunch, the ministers will discuss progress for finalising the negotiations on the free trade agreement with Japan, after the agreement in principle formalised on 6 July (see EUROPE 11824). The Commission continues to be confident about the possibility of finalising the agreement by the end of 2017, by closing the issues that are still outstanding – including on investments (see EUROPE 11891).
Implementation of trade agreements. The Commission will inform ministers about ongoing work on implementing free trade agreements concluded by the EU on the basis of a report published on Thursday (see other article). This report comes as part of the extension of the consideration by trade ministers in May of the need to ensure good application of the free trade agreements' arrangements so that and EU citizens and operators can take full advantage of them.
Sustainable development clauses. Over lunch, the ministers will discuss how to improve cooperation with third countries on issues linked to sustainable development (labour rights and environmental protection) as part of trade negotiations, and in order to ensure that the commitments made are upheld. (Original version in French by Emmanuel Hagry)