ISDS Case Map
Guyana
Senior representatives of the government, the opposition political parties, the trade union movement, the private sector, religious bodies and other non-governmental organizations unanimously called on regional leaders not to sign it in its present form.
Weeks ago President of Guyana, Bharrat Jagdeo, announced his scepticism on signing the Economic Partnership Agreement trade deal with the European Community. Now it has been revealed that the Guyanese government will be hosting public consultations on the proposed arrangement come the beginning of September.
The Caribbean could suffer economically if a proposed free trade agreement between several regional countries and the European Union is signed because of damaging flaws in the deal, according to Bharrat Jagdeo, Guyana's president. “Europe negotiated in bad faith. We were bullied into this.”
The Guyana government wants more time to consider "troubling" aspects of the Economic Partnership Agreement with the EU. "No Government can be deaf to the outcry of important groups in its society," Guyana's Minister of Foreign Affairs, Carolyn Rodrigues, said. "We are democracies, not command economies. If our populations do not believe the agreement is in their interest, if they believe it has been imposed upon them, it will not work."
Guyana will not sign the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) until it has completed a full national consultation or alternatively "pragmatically earlier if the EC [European Commission] continues with its bully-boy tactics of seeking to impose tariffs on our exports," President Bharrat Jagdeo said.
Central to many of the contentious planks that remain (especially 4-9) is the observation of Timothy Kondo (Alternatives to Neo-liberalism in Southern Africa) that the draft EPA, which formed the basis of negotiations for his region was prepared by the EU, (Third World Economics, October 1-15, 2007). This observation was reiterated more generally by Marc Maes: "The texts that the Commission has tabled have reflected the Commission's approach to global trade. They do not reflect the interests and needs of ACP countries." (ibid, p12)
Minister of Foreign Trade and International Cooperation Dr Henry Jeffrey and Indonesia's Ambassador to Guyana, Suprijanto Muhadi on Wednesday signed an agreement on the promotion and protection of investments in the two countries.
Guyana Monday announced it would delay its entry into the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA) -- a regional economic integration project boosted by Venezuela to counter the Free Trade Area of the Americas proposed by the United States. "We will see what happens now, as we initialed the Economic Cooperation Agreement with Europe," Guyana's Foreign Minister said.
President Bharat Jagdeo of Guyana confessed that the economic partnership agreement signed by the Caribbean with the EU is a bad deal and the region has little to gain from it.
If the agricultural sectors of Caribbean Community (CARICOM) countries are to remain viable amidst reformations to longstanding preferential arrangements and other emerging threats, then the injection of new and added finance into the Region's agriculture is necessary for it to survive and remain viable.
