Brussels, 26/04/2001 (Agence Europe) - Whereas protests are heating up in Central America, speaking to MEPs on Tuesday, Commissioner Pascal Lamy defended the "historic" agreement concluded with the United States in view of ending the dispute over bananas (see EUROPE of 12 April, p. 7). The person responsible for the Union's trade policy assured his audience that European producers would not lose out and spoke of "compensating" Ecuador, whose support - far from gained - is primordial to succeed in the test in Geneva.
Torn between the reluctance of its producers and the interests of its exporters, the Ecuadorian authorities adopted their official position on the transatlantic compromise Wednesday evening, at the end of a day of comprehensive consultations with the ministers concerned and representatives of the sector, headed by Foreign minister Heinz Moeller. Quito did, however, decide not to render its stance public until next Wednesday, to leave time for the relentless telephone contacts between Quito's chief negotiator and the European Commissioner Pascal Lamy to bear fruit and Community experts to complete the new regulation. However, an Ecuadorian official, quoted by the EFE agency, revealed the major outlines. According to Ricardo Estrada, President of the Governmental Council for the Promotion of Exports and Investments, the Ecuadorian authorities intend insisting that the Union implement the "1st there 1st served" mechanism which it has provided itself with since the beginning of the year, rather than that of tariff references agreed with Washington, otherwise they could once again turn to the arbitration procedure within the World Trade Organisation (WTO). Ecuador is thus said to have decided to demand the activation of this European quota management system (which has to disappear in 2006, in favour of an purely tariff system) planned for 1 July, and to "go as far as setting up an WTO panel is necessary", Mr. Estrada indicated. He specified that the government plans beforehand to try the road of dialogue with the Union and the United States to seek to reach a negotiated solution to this dispute but that, if there is no satisfactory response to its demands, it will go to Geneva where there has already been a ruling in its favour against the European import regime. This time, Quito is still convinced that the system of "historicity" retained by Washington and Brussels for sharing out quota quantities comprises certain failings regarding WTO rules.
European legal sources admit that the mechanism based on the reference period 1994-96 could again come up against objections from the international trade arbiter and that the fate of the solution envisaged by the American and Community administrations is mortgaged by the need to obtain a waiver (derogation to Article XIII of GATT) for the preferential treatment of bananas from the African, Caribbean and Pacific countries. This was confirmed on Monday in Luxembourg by European Commissioner Franz Fischler during a lunch with the Agriculture Council. Nonetheless, this problem will not be raised if no-one raises it in Geneva, hence the need to obtain approval from Quito. The adoption of the new regulation organising the Community banana regime has therefore been postponed by one week, at the request of some Member States. It will therefore be next Monday, that the committee on "banana" management should adopt this text, to allow a licensing system to be set in place for the allocation of quota quantities, on the date set but on the basis of the principle of historicity instead of "first come first served", a change that gives rise to concern among not only the producers of Costa Rica, the US multinational Dole - which states that "this action gives one company, Chiquita, a dominant and fixed share of the Union market - but also European and African producers.
"We shall not be fully satisfied until a country like Ecuador, for which the production of bananas is so important, backs the (Euro-American) agreement, and, because of this, we must seek to compensate it", Mr Lamy declared on Tuesday speaking before the European Parliament's Committee on Industry and Trade. Mr Lamy had had talks the day before with the Ecuadorian foreign minister. He gave his assurance to MEPs who expressed concern that this agreement will not affect Community producers adversely. He recalled the other "programmes for aid to production" that they benefit from.