Brussels, 05/05/2009 (Agence Europe) - In addition to global issues such as climate change, reform of the international financial architecture, commitment to market opening in view of the crisis, and the conclusion of the Doha Round, bilateral economic cooperation was at the centre of work by the EU-Japan summit in Prague on 4 May. In their final joint declaration, European and Japanese leaders reiterate the importance that they attribute to the 2001 action plan for cooperation between Japan and the EU, as a basis for fruitful dialogue and cooperation between the two parties. They also underline their intention to begin reflection on ways to replace the current action plan after it expires in 2011, the aim being to initiate official talks during the bilateral summit in 2010.
In their joint statement, European and Japanese leaders also underline the fact that strengthening the integration of their economies requires tackling restrictive trade barriers, increasing market access opportunities and creating the best possible environment for promoting bilateral direct investment flows. To achieve this, they agree on the need to “put focus on a few specific non-tariff issues which are expected to bring concrete outcomes, in a mutually beneficial way and in a short period, utilising existing mechanisms such as the high-level consultation, the bilateral regulatory reform dialogue, the high-level trade dialogue, the industrial policy and industrial cooperation dialogue and the other bilateral dialogues more effectively”. Progress accomplished will be assessed at the 2010 summit at the latest.
Included in a chapter devoted to bilateral cooperation, which sets out the progress accomplished by sector - science, research and technology, customs cooperation, aviation, intellectual property, higher education and university cooperation, financial services, security and consumer protection - this paragraph is important as Europeans and Japanese differ somewhat over the form to be taken by the future joint framework governing their economic relations. Despite the common resolve to intensify bilateral trade, they find it difficult to reach a common strategy. Envying the process begun with South Korea for a bilateral free trade agreement, which would provide South Korean exporters preferential access to the Community market, Japan recommends a bilateral agreement giving priority to greater tariff liberalisation. On the European side, the Commission and member states focus more on non-tariff barriers set in place by Tokyo, which restrict the penetration and expansion of European companies in the Japanese archipelago, and they do not hesitate to criticise the closure of the Japanese market to European goods and investment. On the eve of the EU-Japan summit, in April 2008, Peter Mandelson had described Japan as a “fortress”, inviting Tokyo to open the country up to foreign and European investment. “For each dollar invested by Japan in Europe since 2006, European enterprises have only invested 3 cents in Japan”, the former trade commissioner said.
Japan, which is the second largest economic power, was the EU's fifth trading partner in 2007. Bilateral trade in goods reached a total value of €121.9 billion in 2007, the volume of EU exports to Japan amounting to €43.8 billion. In 2006, foreign direct investment (FDI) between the EU and Japan amounted to €174.8 billion. (E.H./transl.jl)