Résumé
The principal elements of the European Commission's recent Communication on its external trade policy (titled "Global Europe") are assessed in this paper. Certain shifts are discernible in the Commission's position, in particular as they relate to the prominence given to market access objectives and to bilateral and regional trade agreements. Even so, this latest Communication is probably best thought of as an evolution in the Commission's trade policy and not an abrupt break with the past. Particular attention is given here to the potential payoffs from the proposed bilateral trade negotiations with selected Asian nations and the need for further thinking on the Commission's part with respect to the multilateral trading system.
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Extrait
'Global Europe': An Initial Assessment of the European Commission's New Trade Policy
1 Introduction
In 2005, Europe imported 18.03 percent of the world's traded goods, transactions whose total value exceeded 1.4 trillion US dollars. Two-thirds of those imported goods were manufactures, a quarter were fuels and mining products, and the remainder agricultural goods. The buying power of nearly 460 million people living in the 25 countries that make up the European Union (EU), a union whose combined gross domestic product exceeds 12 trillion US dollars, is one important factor that underlies the potential clout of Europe's trade policy. Likewise, the vast scale of Europe's exports to the rest of the world provides its policymakers with a strong interest in commercial conditions abroad. It is significant, therefore, when the European Commission (EC) issues a new Communication on its external trade policy, as it did in October 2006.The purpose of this paper and the others in this Special Issue is to assess the principal elements of this Communication, ascertaining where changes might be expected and their rationale and likely effects. The contributors to this Special Issue were drawn from important regions of the world economy and no attempt was made to arrive at a common viewpoint. So as to reduce the overlap between this paper and others in the Special Issue, here I focus on the following three matters: the relationship between the latest Communication and its predecessors (thus allowing an assessment of the extent to which this Communication actually represents a departure from existing EC practice); the likely payoffs to European exporters of the European Commission joining the scramble for Asian market access compared to other options available to European firms; and the need for further thinking by the European Commission on the future of the multilateral trading system. As a result, the paper is organised as follows: The next section provides a brief overview of the October 2006 Communication by the European Commission on its external trade policy. Sections three through five each address the three matters described immediately above. Concluding remarks are found in section six.2 A Brief Overview of the European Commission's Recent Communication on External Trade PolicyOn 4 October 2006, the EC issued a Communication titled "Global Europe: Competing in the World" and, significantly, subtitled this document "A Contribution to the EU's Growth and Jobs Strategy" (EU 2006a).1 The subtitle indicates an important feature of this Communication, namely that it concerns the contribution of the EU's external trade policy to ...Voir le contenu complet de ce document
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