Since the end of the Cold War, Africa’s status in the internationalgeopolitical order has risen dramatically. The continent was once treated as a convenient battlefield in the global rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union. Now, the continent’s increasing importance as a source of energy supplies and other raw materials, has radically altered the picture. This has led to the growing economic and military involvement of China, India, and other emerging industrial powers in Africa and to the re-emergence of Russia as an economic and military power on the continent. In response the United States has dramatically increased its military presence in Africa and created a new military command – the Africa Command or Africom – to protect what it has defined as its “strategic national interests” in Africa. This has ignited what has come to be known as the “new scramble for Africa” and is transforming the security architecture of Africa.
The Joint Africa-EU Strategic Partnership and Action Plan was adopted in Lisbon in 2007. This new strategy, which is often referred to as a ‘people-centred partnership’, was launched with the purpose of scaling-up political dialogue between the African Union (AU) and the EU in the interests of building a solid and sustainable continent-to-continent partnership. It aims to reinvigorate and elevate cooperation between Africa and Europe in the fight against poverty, injustice, human rights violations, lawlessness, insecurity and political and social instability. The priorities of the partnership programme are organised around eight themes: peace and security; democratic governance and human rights; trade, regional integration and infrastructure; the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs); energy; climate change; migration, mobility and employment; and science, information society and space. The programme stipulates that Africa and the EU will pursue and implement policies and programmes that facilitate the active involvement of diaspora communities in the implementation of the strategy.
For a long time it has been necessary to move beyond sterile debates for or against Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs). The real issue is: what kind of EPAs will support African governments in their efforts to promote the structural transformation of their economies, so that they can move beyond the production of simple and unprocessed products to the production of a range of higher value products, for national, regional and international markets, and in the process help them tackle poverty and employment issues. This paper seeks to situate the ongoing EPA negotiations and debate around contentious issues in the context of the wider European Union (EU) trade policy and African aspirations for sustainable development and poverty reduction.
Le présent document examine certains aspects fondamentauxdu processus d’ajustement du secteur agricole et alimentaire européen, dans le cadre de la réforme de la Politique agricole commune (PAC). Il met en évidence le changement d’outils politiques opéré par l’UE, illustré par l’abandon du soutien aux prix agricoles au profit du soutien aux revenus de ses agriculteurs, ainsi que par la réorientation de sa politique en faveur de la qualité des produits agricoles et alimentaires et au détriment de la quantité. De même, le document passe en revue les conséquences d’un tel changement, l’UE étant de moins en moins en faveur d’un recours aux mesures de politiquecommerciale dans les politiques de développement agricole en faveur de pays tiers. Il rappelle, au passage, les implications d’une telle évolution pour les secteurs agricole et alimentaire en Afrique, avant de tirer des conclusions et de formuler quelques recommandations d’ordre général.