Understanding agricultural trade, development and biodiversity linkages in six African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries

From 2007-2009, the UNEP Trade and Biodiversity Initiative is supporting country projects in six ACP countries to assess the economic, social and environmental impacts of agricultural trade policies with specific attention being paid to the impacts and opportunities for biodiversity.

• Country projects updates :

The country projects were launched during the first half of 2007 and National Steering Committees (NSC) were established to guide the implementation of the country projects. Back-to-back with the launch workshops, the country teams conducted capacity-building workshops targeting those stakeholders that will directly contribute to the realization of the project. The objective of the workshops was to bring these stakeholders onto equal footing regarding the main stages of the integrated assessment process. Stakeholders include representatives from relevant government ministries (such as the Ministry of Agriculture, Environment, Trade, and Development), international organizations, the private sector, unions and associations, academia, NGOs, local communities affected by the project and other relevant institutions.

During the implementation of the integrated assessment studies between 2007 and 2009, the teams organized national steering committee meetings and national stakeholder workshops at several points in time to review the focus, approach and preliminary findings of the study, and receive feedback and input from the most relevant stakeholders in the sector. In early 2009, country project teams finalized the assessment reports and brought the results and recommendation of the assessment to the attention of relevant government departments and national stakeholders through validation workshops. At the same time, the teams started to work on national policy action plans for the implementation of selected recommendations.

The integrated assessments focused on the following trade policies and sectors:

• Cameroon : Impacts of trade liberalization in the cacao sector following the 6th International Agreement on Cacao, focusing on national law No. 2004/025.
  
• Jamaica : Impacts of reforms of the EU-ACP Sugar Protocol as part of the EU-ACP Economic Partnership Agreement negotiations (loss of trade preferences).
  
• Mauritius : Impacts of reforms of the EU-ACP Sugar Protocol as part of EU-ACP Economic Partnership Agreement negotiations (loss of trade preferences), looking specifically at the Multi Annual Adaptation Strategy.
  
• Madagascar : Impacts of potential loss of trade preferences in the aquaculture shrimp sector following the EU-ACP Economic Partnership Agreement negotiations looking specifically at the “plan directeur” and potential certification schemes in the sector.
  
  
• Uganda : Impacts of trade liberalisation in the horticulture sector following EU-ACP Economic Partnership Agreement negotiations.

• Papua New Guinea : Impacts on two major staple food crops (taro and sweet potato) of trade liberalisation measures (particularly tariff reduction) affecting major export crops (coffee and oil palm).

National-level events:

5-7 March 2007, Launch and capacity-building workshop, Yaoundé, Cameroon (Report of the Launch Workshop)

16-19 April 2007, Launch and capacity-building workshop, Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea (Report of the Launch Workshop)

23-25 April 2007, Launch and capacity building workshop, Port Louis, Mauritius (Report of the Launch Workshop)

9-11 May 2007, Launch and capacity-building workshop, Antananarivo, Madagascar (Report of the Launch Workshop)

12-13 September 2007, Capacity building workshop for the Region Boeny, Mahajanga, Madagsacar (Report of Capacity Building Workshop)

29-31 May 2007, Launch and capacity-building workshop, Kampala, Uganda (Report of the Capacity Building Workshop) (Report of the Launch Workshop)


15 May 2008, National Stakeholder Meeting, Kingston, Jamaica



For further information on this initiative, please contact Vera Weick
at vera.weick@unep.ch or Benjamin Simmons
at benjamin.simmons@unep.ch. .