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Publishers Abstract:
For the last three decades, the trade relations between the European Communities (EC) on the one hand and the African, Caribbean and Pacific group of States (ACP) on the other have been governed by a series of bilateral treaties designed to provide preferential terms of access for ACP products to the EC market. These treaties were commonly known as the Lome Agreements, later replaced by the Cotonou Partnership Agreement which is in force today. Under the terms of these agreements, goods of ACP origin enter the European market either free of duties and quotas or on terms more favourable than those available to most-favoured nation suppliers. The key features of this long-established trade relationship between the EC and the ACP countries are set for a fundamental change. The parties are currently in the midst of intense negotiations for a new set of trade and development arrangements to be called Economic Partnership Agreements.
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