Mauritania has signed the regional economic partnership agreement (EPA) that has for long been negotiated between the 16 countries of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) plus Mauritania and the EU. The news was announced by the European Commission on Friday 21 September, the day of the signature.
Mauritania is the 15th country to sign the agreement, which was negotiated under the Cotonou Agreement that links the EU and the ACP (Africa, Caribbean and Pacific) countries. Now only Nigeria is left to sign it.
The Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana (two middle-income countries) have been applying interim agreements since 2016, while awaiting the ratification and entry into force of the regional EPA.
The joint ACP-EU trade committee is to meet in Brussels on 26 October and will review the seven EPAs between the EU and the ACP regions or countries.
The EPAs are agreements on the progressive and asymmetric liberalisation of trade and are supposed to be tools for development and the harmonious insertion of ACP economies into the global economy. "EPAs are aimed at promoting trade between the EU and African countries, contributing to sustainable development, to increased investment, to job creation and the reduction of poverty", the Commission states in a press release. It believes the EPAs will play a big role in the new Africa-Europe Alliance for sustainable investment and jobs that it has just launched (see EUROPE 12096). (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)