Lusaka — A meeting of the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) and the group of Eastern and Southern Africa (ESA) countries discussing the Economic Partnership Agreement for Eastern and Southern Africa concluded that more work is needed before countries can conclude the EPA agreement under negotiation.

The meeting, which brought together experts and officials from the two regions met on 19-20 July in Lusaka Zambia to consider the findings of impact assessment studies done by the COMESA Secretariat and the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) on 11 national Economic Partnership Agreements.

Among other findings, the studies showed that an EPA will result in some ESA imports being diverted from the rest of the world towards EU and as inherent in all goods, the ESA-EU Free Trade Agreement would result in tariff revenue losses.

In addition, analysis shows that EU imports will increase significantly into ESA region and raise competition for domestic and regional industries for all ESA countries. However, the net increase in imports and concomitant increase in VAT collections from increased imports would mitigate the tariff losses.

As stated by the COMESA Secretary General, Mr. Sindiso Ngwenya, EPAs should support ESA development and regional integration and that while the EU remains an important trade and development partner for ESA region, the partnership needs to undergo fundamental review to take account of recent developments in the ES region.

"Parties should not impose conditionalities as that is counterproductive," he said.

On the way forward, the meeting recommended that the studies be finalized by the end of August. Countries were advised to decide on whether or not to use the findings of the studies. In addition, since the October 2014 deadline for the withdrawal of EC regulation 1528 does not affect ESA countries, no country is under pressure to sign the EPA by that date.

Accordingly, more work would be needed to prepare the group's position on engaging the EU to address the contentious issues and conclude the negotiations as soon as possible. The ESA group was urged to continue to follow the progress of EPA negotiations in other regions and coordinate positions and backstop its positions where appropriate.

All ESA countries reiterated their commitment to continue EPA negotiations with a view to conclude an EPA that responds to the original objectives of such negotiations namely: to support ESA development, regional integration and economic transformation.