THE CARIFORUM- UNITED KINGDOM ECONOMIC PARTNERSHIP AGREEMENT It should be noted that consequent to the United Kingdom’s decision to leave the EU, it was necessary to conclude an arrangement that would continue to facilitate trade. The agreement concluded is a roll-over agreement, with the provisions of the CARIFORUMUK EPA being very similar to those of the CARIFORUM-EU EPA. A. THE CARIFORUM-EU ECONOMIC PARTNERSHIP AGREEMENT On October 20, 2008, H.E. Dr. Patrick Gomes, Guyana’s Ambassador in Brussels, signed the CARIFORUM-EU Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) on behalf of the Government of Guyana. The actual conclusion of the Agreement was consistent with both the provisions of the Cotonou Partnership Agreement and the terms of the waiver granted on the Cotonou trade regime at the WTO Ministerial Conference in Doha (November 2001). The EPA contains provisions on Customs Duties; Rules of Origin; Nontariff Measures; Trade Defense Measures (Anti-Dumping, countervailing measures, multilateral and bilateral safeguards); Customs and Trade Facilitation, Technical Barriers to Trade, Sanitary and Phyto-sanitary Measures, Agriculture and Fisheries, Services and Investment; Current Payment and Capital Movements, Competition Policy, Innovation and Intellectual Property, Personal Data Protection; Public Procurement, and Environmental and Social Aspects of Sustainable Development. The CARIFORUM-EU EPA is pro-development in two major respects; (a) calibrating commitments that are reflective of the parties’ respective levels of development as well as taking into account differences within CARIFORUM; and (b) enshrining commitments on EU development assistance in priority areas identified by CARIFORUM States. In pursuit of this objective, the EPA contains a Joint Declaration on Development Cooperation that identifies the European Development Fund (EDF) and EU Member States’ Aid for Trade commitments as sources of EU development support. In seeking to address the historically poor rates of EDF disbursement, the EPA also identifies funding of the CARICOM Development Fund as an institutional vehicle to support EPA implementation in the Caribbean.
Year Edition, 2020
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