Assessing the Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs): a product level approach

With the temporarily suspension of the WTO negotiations, the Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) launched by the EU in 2002 and that will come into being in 2008 , becomes the major the major trade challenge for the African, Caribbean and Pacific countries(ACP) which nowadays are the most vulnerable countries in the global trading system. The negotiations on EPAs define a new stage in the development policy of the EU towards developing countries which is fully compatible with the WTO trading rules, in the sense of article XXIV GATT. However many concerns arise. The first of them is the ability of ACP countries to give preferential access to EU products, entering in a reciprocal preferences system with the EU. Moreover, the calendar is extremely tight and numerous levels of freedom are still to be defined as the modalities of trade liberalization that will fit the WTO rules (scope of coverage, speed). Our study intends to present a very detailed analysis of the trade-related aspects of EPAs negotiations. We use a dynamic partial equilibrium model at the HS6 level (5,113 hs6 products). The main source of trade data are Comext and BACI, while ad-valorem tariffs and Tariffs-RateQuotas are provided by MacMapHS6v2. Thanks to this we can accurately deal with the crucial aspect of sensitive products. Sensitive products selection will be based on different criterions, such as "political sensibility" or "sectors' vulnerability", at the single country level and by group of negotiation. The dynamic aspect of the model will allow different transition periods of EPAs implementation to be taken into account. Different simulations will be performed in order to assess the impact of both the alternative EPAs negotiations and the "alternative trade agreements" to them, whenever EPAs would not be signed. The consequences of EPA will be assessed through different indicators: exports and imports variation, changes in duties income, current account and also, food balance (including calories indicators). A discussion will be conducted to compare these PE results to GE analyses conducted on the EPAs.