And the winner is…. the EU’s measurement instrument industry, perhaps. The European Commission recently published the final outcome of negotiations in the public procurement area agreed with Mexico as part of an upgrade of the EU Mexico Global Agreement. It took the two parties less than two years to upgrade …
Mexico
EU and Mexico finalise procurement talks, pave way for revamped trade agreement
It took almost two years. In the summer 2018, the EU and Mexico announced they had concluded a wide-ranging renegotiation of a now twenty-year-old trade pact, pending a risky major negotiation ahead: market access in the area of public procurement. So much happened in the meantime, including an election in …
Week in Brussels: Movement on Mexico, Korea labour dispute, Uzbekistan
It’s been a pretty packed week. Here other low-key but important developments in EU trade policy. EU Mexico FTA stirrings The EU and Mexico had concluded negotiations towards the modernisation of a twenty year old free trade agreement in April 2018. But that agreement ‘in principle’ left the parties with …
USMCA challenges EU’s advance on GI protection – but too late for Mexico?
The recently concluded US-Mexico-Canada trade agreement includes a clear challenge to the EU’s strategy of ‘globalising’ its protection of Geographical Indications by including their provisions within international free trade agreements. The new clauses, contained within the USMCA’s Section 20 on Intellectual Property, set out rigorous procedures to permit any new …
USMCA: EU should take note of certain provisions
He’s done it again: US President Donald Trump took credit for clinching a “wonderful” deal with Canada after Washington and Ottawa said they had reworked the North Atlantic Free Trade Agreement just weeks after Mexico accepted a revision of the trilateral pact. Sunday’s announcement came six days after Trump finalised …
FTA roundup: Mexico, Japan, Singapore, Australia and New Zealand
There have been a few developments and clarifications on the variety of bilateral free trade agreements under way in the EU in recent days. So here are some updates on where things stand with Mexico, Singapore, Japan, Australia and New Zealand. EU-Mexico ‘agreement in principle’ – next steps …
Week ahead in EU trade: INTA, Brexit, investment screening
Two events will happen in Brussels this week that merit close attention: the European Parliament’s international trade committee will discuss a range of headline-worthy issues during its two-day meeting and the Working Party on Trade Questions will discuss investment screening. The churn on Article 50 negotiations between the EU27 and …
Comment: EU trade agreement agriculture quotas are of little use
Import quotas on sensitive agricultural products opened in the EU’s latest FTAs appear to be of little use to both exporters and importers. The last round of EU-Mercosur trade negotiations held last week ended in acrimony. Both EU agriculture market access – aka quotas on beef, sugar and ethanol …
Blog: EU-Mexico agreement – key elements
The European Commission has released an 18-page document on the EU-Mexico free trade deal that was concluded over the weekend. Here are the distilled contents of the modernisation exercise, with yours truly’s knee-jerk reactions and annotations. Negotiators will work over the coming months on a final pact ready to …
In brief: EU and Mexico reach political agreement over modernised trade pact
The EU and Mexico have decided it’s time to declare the deal done. In a joint statement released on Saturday night, the EU’s trade and agriculture commissioners and Mexico’s economy minister said that “after several months of intense negotiations, this afternoon we reached an agreement in principle on trade …