Lomé Convention

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The Lomé Convention (also known as the Lomé Convention ) was an agreement between the EC countries and 77 developing countries in Africa , the Caribbean and the Pacific ( ACP countries ), named after the Togolese capital Lomé . It was signed on February 28, 1975 as the successor to the Yaoundé Convention and supplemented by Lomé II on October 31, 1979, by Lomé III on December 8, 1984 and by Lomé IV on December 15, 1989. On June 23, 2000, the agreement was replaced by the subsequent Cotonou Agreement .

As a result of the establishment of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 1995, a number of reform requirements have arisen with regard to ACP-EU relations. These were taken into account in the Cotonou Agreement signed in June 2000. This new legal basis for ACP-EU relations will run for 20 years. During a transition period that lasted until the end of 2007, the provisions of the expired Lomé IV Convention continued to apply. On January 1, 2008, the new, WTO-compliant rules came into effect.

Relations between the Community and the former colonies of the EU states were explicitly assigned a special role in the founding treaties for the establishment of the EEC . The aim of the mutual relations, which have been practiced on the basis of multi-year agreements since the mid-1960s, is comprehensive economic, financial, developmental and cultural cooperation. With the Lomé Agreement, the EC / EU states completely renounced counter-preferences in trade agreements in the industrial sector and largely in the agricultural sector. These countries were given preferential market access in Europe. In addition, the Lomé Conventions included insurance for export earnings. If these fall due to a drop in prices on the world market , a compensation payment was made from the STABEX fund . This system was applied to 49 agricultural products and 7 mining products. Most of the cost of this agreement came from development aid through grants and cheap loans. These were paid from the European Development Fund , 25% of which is provided by Germany . This was primarily intended to promote agriculture and rural areas, but could also support other areas if necessary. Most recently, the main points of the AKP funding were the promotion of democracy , human rights , the rule of law and framework conditions favorable to the private sector. Relations between the EU and the ACP countries are an overall development policy concept that uses a large number of cooperation instruments.

criticism

Criticism of this contract arises primarily from its contradictions, such as the promotion of agriculture with simultaneous import restrictions in the EU market. In order to protect EU agriculture, access to the EU market for many agricultural products is restricted, but these are also the main export goods of the ACP countries. Due to their low level of industrialization , the market opening of the EC / EU states was of little importance in the industrial sector.

In addition, the new north-south connections enable the relatively safe crossing of the Erg (desert) for the first time , which not only promotes the transport of goods, but also facilitates the flow of refugees from equatorial Africa.

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