Key Points from the Sixteenth Meeting of the Working Group on Trade Liberalisation and Facilitation

The meeting noted progress in the implementation of the Group’s 2004 Strategy and Action Plan. Twenty-two of the 28 FTAs are in force. Serious concern was expressed at continuing delays in ratification in Bosnia and Herzegovina. SEE countries reported a busy schedule of joint committee meetings, underway or scheduled, to deal with implementation of the FTAs. Macedonia was asked to inform on the status of several issues.

The latest tables on conformity of the FTAs with the trade coverage criteria of the MoU registered progress. The draft report on Non-Tariff Barriers in the Western Balkans was presented. The meeting emphasised the need to use the report’s results in the Procedure on NTBs as required by the MoU and to make its results widely known, in a user-friendly fashion, particularly among the business community.

The initial discussion of the GEM paper on options for further harmonisation of the FTAs revealed a consensus that a multilateral agreement would improve the efficiency of the network of FTAs. CEFTA could be a model for such an agreement provided issues such as entry criteria and how to ”modernise” the agreement were satisfactorily addressed.

Implementation of the Action Plan for services will be expedited through an EC/Cards funded project to facilitate harmonisation of the regulatory regimes in key service areas.

The new Deputy Special Co-ordinator of the Stability Pact, Michael Mozur introduced the draft Strategy and Action Plan for 2005. This document will be the basis for the report to Ministers in November, as required by the Rome Ministerial Statement.

Activities to promote the FTA process have intensified as evidenced by TWG participation in the meetings in Belgrade of EuroChambres on October 6 and of the International Business Forum on October 8. Technical assistance projects and programmes continue and the table on donor-funded projects will be updated on a continuous basis.

The Group thanked the Ministry of International Economic Relations of Serbia and Montenegro for their kind hospitality. The next meeting of the TWG will take place in early 2005, location to be deterimed.