Many members of the European Parliament’s Committee on International Trade (INTA) on Thursday 15 October welcomed the document aimed at placing sustainable development at the centre of the Union’s trade policy, which was presented at the beginning of May by France and the Netherlands, two Member States which often defend contradictory positions on the subject (see EUROPE 12480/14).
A proposal advocating an incentive approach caught the attention of Rafaela Samira (Renew Europe, Netherlands), Heidi Hautala (Greens/EFA, Finland) and Geert Bourgeois (ECR, Belgium): that of lowering tariffs on certain products when an EU trading partner meets high environmental and social standards.
“Reward” better performance by offering lower tariffs, said Dutch Minister Sigrid Kaag.
On behalf of the EPP group, Luxembourg’s Christophe Hansen and Hungary’s Enikő Győri advocated using the trade agreements the EU signs with its partners “as carrots rather than sticks”. If the chapters on sustainable development are strengthened in future agreements, what will happen to the current agreements? - asked Mr Hansen.
The Dutch and French Trade Ministers detailed further proposals contained in their joint paper designed to feed into the European reflection on the future of EU trade policy which will lead to a European Commission Communication in the first quarter of 2021.
Mrs Kaag called for the Paris Agreement to be taken into account in all future trade agreements, as well as for corporate social and environmental responsibility throughout supply chains. To Mr Hansen, she replied that it is not a question of renegotiating the free trade agreements already in place.
Welcoming a new “lucidity” on the widening socio-economic divergences due to unconditional trade opening, Emmanuel Maurel (GUE/NGL, France) criticised the fact that the EU’s trading partners are currently not bound “by any constraint in terms of compliance with the Paris Agreement”.
Believing that this Franco-Dutch initiative demonstrates that “things are moving” in trade matters, Franck Riester pleaded for an improvement in impact studies (updating of data, scope of investigation) and better integration of sustainable development issues at the WTO. Above all, he reiterated the importance for the European Union, which has set itself the objective of climate neutrality by 2050, to equip itself with a WTO-compatible “carbon adjustment mechanism” to ensure a level playing field within the internal market (see EUROPE 12563/29). He recalled that a specific legislative proposal was expected in the first quarter of 2021 with a view of implementation by early 2023 at the latest.
To Hervé Juvin (ID, France), who raised the question of relocating production in order to improve the EU’s environmental and social performance, Mr Riester replied that the issue was indeed worth studying in the light of experience with the Covid-19 pandemic.
See the Franco-Dutch document: https://bit.ly/2yuQ3pD (Original version in French by Mathieu Bion)