Media Releases > Oxfam Ireland Press Release

African voices call on people of Ireland to help stop new anti-development push on poorest countries

9 October 2006

Timothy Kondo from Zimbabwe and
John Sharp from Oxfam Ireland

Activists from Tanzania and Zimbabwe visited Ireland this week to increase the pressure on European Union governments to halt the push for unfair international trade agreements with some of the world's poorest countries.

Henry Wejja from a Tanzanian farmers' organisation and Timothy Kondo from the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions will meet decision-makers and the public in Belfast, Cork and Dublin to highlight their concerns over the proposed Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs), which the EU is rushing their governments to sign by the end of 2007.

The visit comes in advance of a November review of the negotiation process and content of EPAs and is being hosted by Oxfam Ireland and the Irish Congress of Trade Unions. Both organisations believe that the current EPA proposals do not give the governments of poor African, Caribbean and Pacific countries the freedom and space to make their own decisions about trade, in the interests of poverty reduction and development.

Brian Scott, Oxfam Ireland Chief Executive said: "Oxfam Ireland and ICTU felt it was time that people here heard the voices of the farmers and workers who will be so affected by these unfair trade agreements. Trade between the EU and poor African, Caribbean and Pacific countries can lift people out of poverty, but only if it is governed by fair rules which allow the growth of farming and industry in developing countries. The EU promised that development would be at the heart of any new trade deal with ACP countries but what we have instead is an extremely aggressive agenda that pays little more than lip service to development."

Timothy Kondo from Zimbabwe said: "We look at EPAs with a lot of suspicion, which emanates from the introduction of the Economic Structural Adjustment Programmes (ESAP) in 1991. The promise then was: more jobs, more decent employment, more investment and a higher standard of living, but the opposite became true. When ESAP was first introduced, the poverty level was below 50%; now it is above 80%. Workers in Zimbabwe suspect that the same may happen with the EPAs."

The Economic Partnership Agreements between the EU and 77 African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries will force some of the poorest countries to open up their markets to European goods and services and introduce new rules on how governments can regulate foreign businesses. To date the EU has offered preferential market access to ACP countries. Now it is looking for access in return. Governments of developing world countries had previously rejected many of the measures now incorporated into the EPAs at the stalled WTO talks.

Neil Alldred from ICTU added: ''The EU has said that these agreements are about supporting development. Instead they appear to be about putting pressure on poor countries to open up to European business and prevent them regulating in the public interest. The ugly truth behind the rhetoric is of rich countries looking to get something from poor countries."

« Return to Press Releases homepage