COMESA and the Secretariat of the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Group of States have agreed on the need to take common positions on emerging issues related to the EU-ACP co-operation and the Intra-ACP co-operation.

Further, they have agreed on the implementation of the forthcoming new trade programme, TradeCom 2 and the future co-operation framework with the European Union.

During a meeting held on the sidelines of the ACP Trade Ministers’ meetings in Brussels on 19 October 2015, COMESA Secretary General, Mr Sindiso Ngwenya, and his ACP counterpart, Ambassador Dr Patrick Gomes agreed that there was need for decentralization of the TradeCom 2 for better efficiency and subsidiarity needs.

They considered the support needed for the tripartite initiative within the East and Southern Africa region to build market linkages and transformation, which was based on the three pillars of: market integration, industrialization and infrastructure development.

The two agreed that TradeCom 2, which is an ACP-EU facility to be launched not later than January 2016, should be used among others, to strengthen South-South triangular Cooperation to enable all ACP regional organizations to share experiences.

Mr Ngwenya said that the priority areas where TradeCom 2 and other ACP facilities should focus to achieve results on the ground are market linkages and productive capacities (sanitary and phytosanitary standards); trade and investment facilitation.

With regard to the document, ACP-EU Joint consultation paper post 2020 “Towards a new partnership between the EU and the ACP Countries after 2020”, submitted by the EU on the new partnership between the ACP countries after 2020, the two chief executives agreed to develop a position paper on how the consultations among the ACP countries and the ACP regional organizations should be conducted. This is in preparation for the 8th ACP Summit that will take place from 31 May to 01 June 2016 in Papua New Guinea.

It was noted that in addition to addressing functional co-operation, the submitted ACP-EU joint consultation paper should also cover the cooperation in a more holistic manner.

With regard to the ACP Inter-Regional Coordination Committee (ACP-IROCC) which was jointly initiated by the Eastern and Southern Africa-Indian Ocean (ESA-IO) region and the ACP Secretariat in 2011, the two chief executives agreed that this framework has to be reactivated as a consultative forum of all ACP-ROs on all issues of common interest.

The first term of the ACP-IROCC was led by COMESA and ACP Secretariat as co-chairs and the ACP Secretariat being a permanent co-chair.

With COMESA and ACP Secretariat as co-chairs it has been recognized that this forum should be maintained and strengthened as a consultative framework between the ACP Secretariat and all ACP regional organizations on all issues related to their cooperation with the EU.

It was agreed that ACP-IROCC meeting should be convened in March 2016 ahead of the joint EU-ACP Council of Ministers scheduled to take place in Dakar from 28 to 29 April 2016. In the interest of continuity and institutional memory, Ambassador Dr Gomes requested his COMESA counterpart – in his capacity as the immediate past co-chair – to accept to coordinate with Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS) and have that meeting convened.

Mr Ngwenya thanked Mr Gomes for the good cooperation that exists between the two organizations.