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Leaders want international community to boost support for ACP states

22 April 2010 at 05:05 | 458 views

The African, Caribbean and Pacific Secretary-General, Dr. Mohamed Ibn Chambas, met with his counterpart Abdou Diouf of the International Organisation of la Francophonie (OIF) in Brussels Wednesday April 21.

At the meeting, they discussed many pertinent issues concerning the two organizations, principal amongst them are the current global challenges facing the ACP Group, which include: the financial crisis, the Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) and climate change.

Both Secretaries-General agreed that the international community needs to scale up its support to the ACP states in order to mitigate the impacts of the financial crisis to help them achieve the MDGs as well as to address the constraints to global trade.

On the EPAs, Dr. Chambas who took-over leadership at the ACP Group last month stressed that the EPAs have to be seen as instruments for development and an option for the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) to gain market access to Europe and integration into the global economy on better terms. The ACP and OIF leaders also called for investments and support for the private sector in the ACP states for value added processing of raw materials and commodities so as to create more jobs in these countries. They pledged to reinforce their cooperation in the area of “culture and development”.

Dr. Chambas also took the opportunity to brief Mr Diouf of the progress in negotiation of the revised Cotonou Agreement, which was initialed last month in Brussels between the EU and ACP and set for signing in June at the Joint ACP-EU Council of Ministers meeting in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso.

Both Dr. Chambas and Mr. Diouf have pledged to deepen cooperation between the two organizations.

The African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States (ACP) is a group of countries (currently 79: 48 African, 16 Caribbean and 15 Pacific), created by the Georgetown Agreement in 1975. The group’s main objectives are sustainable development and poverty reduction within its member states, as well as their greater integration into the world’s economy. All of the member states, except Cuba, are signatories of the Cotonou Agreement with the European Union.

The Cotonou Agreement (signed in Cotonou, Benin in June 2000) is the successor to the Lomé Conventions. One of the major differences from the Lomé Convention is that the partnership is extended to new actors such as civil society, private sector, trade unions and local authorities. These will be involved in consultations and planning of national development strategies, provided with access to financial resources and involved in the implementation of programmes.

Many small island developing states are ACP states; the fourth Lomé Convention was revised in 1995 in Mauritius and gives special attention to island countries in this agreement.

Sierra Leone is an ACP member state.

Photo: ACP Secretary-General, Dr. Mohamed Ibn Chambas, right, welcomes his counterpart H.E Mr. Abdou Diouf of the International Organisation of la Francophonie (OIF) in Brussels during their meeting on Wednesday 21 April 2010.

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