Come December 8 & 9 in Lisbon, Portugal, the European Union and 52 nation African Union will converge for a summit to decide on the free trade partnership between two continents. The recent interim trade pacts of EU with various African countries will serve as a foundation for the negotiations to be held during the summit. The African nations should be better prepared for the summit this time around because they always faltered in the trade negotiation table in the past. EU too should not try to exploit their weakness.
The sole aim of the summit is to create winners in international trade and thus resurrect the African economy. Many in Africa feel that the Economic Partnership Agreement (E.P.A) would not be of great advantage to their reeling economy. Instead of rushing to ratify E.P.A which is in line with W.T.O., the EU should go in for more interim trade pacts, they had in recent times. Through these pacts both the parties can study the pros and cons of the guide lines of E.P.A and restructure a new more appealing E.P.A.
Now the onus is on the EU to achieve meaningful trade solution which could ultimately benefit the poorest nations in Africa. EU’s pro-active approach towards the development of some of the poor African nations would yield positive results only if they make compromises on free trade profits.