BASSETERRE, St. Kitts – The coming of a new trade agreement with Canada has brought into focus the labour and environmental standards of member states of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), as Canadian counterparts have made these areas high priority for trade partners.
The new Canada-Caribbean Free Trade Agreement, which replaces the 20-year old Caribbean Canada (CaribCan) pact, is a composite trade arrangement expected to provide equal access for Canadian companies to the Caribbean market. It will also include new provisions for domestic regulation, legal and institutional issues and dispute settlement, as well as the entry of service-providers and sectors for liberalization.
According to Canada's diplomatic representative to CARICOM Francois Montour, both sides would have to agree to an evaluation and monitoring of labour and environmental laws before they are able to agree on the new free trade agreement.
In a news briefing at the Guyana-based CARICOM, Montour reported that Canadian parliamentarians have stressed that all new trade agreements with sub-regional groupings must require evidence of respect for labour and environmental laws and policies.
Trade Policy Officer in the St. Kitts-Nevis Ministry of International Trade, Cosbert Woods, explained that Canada and CARICOM did not agree to incorporate provisions of labour and environmental standards in the free trade agreements, adding that these will be “side agreements” to meet Canada’s concerns.
“Within the scope of negotiations, what they would do is have a side agreement for labour cooperation and a side agreement for environmental cooperation, so they wouldn’t specifically be engulfed in the free trade agreement.
“These agreements should provide for cooperation in labour and environmental standards without specifically resorting to sanctions,” Woods told SKNVibes.
Resulting from the new free trade agreement, the labour and environmental laws of the 15 CARICOM member states will come under strict scrutiny from Canada. The nation has enjoyed satisfactory labour laws and environmental impact assessments have become a routine part of development, but, according to Woods, this will assist the region in coping with demands of evolving labour and environmental standards.
“There is always room for improvement in every area that we operate…. We are in a global economy and things are evolving very rapidly, so this kind of assistance would prepare us to deal with the changes in labour and environmental standards.
“As part of any trade agreement that St. Kitts-Nevis and the rest of CARICOM involve themselves into, we tend to look for development assistance in areas that we may lack capacity and the necessary resources to fully implement them. So, we do welcome such assistance and encourage a sort of symbiotic relationship between our trading partners….,” Woods added.
The existing CaribCan trade agreement ends next year when the current five-year WTO waiver for the Caribbean countries' tariff regime expires on December 31, 2011. It is expected that the new arrangement will be decided on or before this time.
