Presenter: A British Government Minister has described the new liberalised trade
deal negotiated between the Caribbean and the European Union as a tool to aid
competitiveness. CARICOM countries and the Dominican Republic initialled the economic
(indistinct) agreement last December but it has been criticised by some labour and civil
society groups who fear that Caribbean goods won't be able to compete against EU products.
(Indistinct) has since said it doesn't want to sign the accord but it has been defended
by Britain's Foreign and Commonwealth Office Minister Meg Munn. She spoke to BBC's
Caribbean's Mike Jarvis.
Meg Munn: To work together in a way which means that trade can go both ways and to
have a situation where markets are developing. It is a tough world out there in terms of
trading but we need to make sure that we are working together on this and that we continue
to have good trading relationships and that's what we've been doing.
Mike Jarvis: Does it put the UK in a bit of an awkward position on the one hand here
your essentially former colonies, which still have a good relationship with the UK in a
sort of historical setting, but on the other hand the UK, essentially, has an obligation
to Europe. So you're sort of caught in the middle aren't you?
MM: Well this isn't about being caught in the middle this is about developing good
links between us and the Caribbean but also between the European Union and the Caribbean.
We want to see competitive industries in the Caribbean and this is (interruption on
broadcast) is one way that we can do that. And we'll continue to work with Caribbean
countries because we do have those strong links.
MJ: So the UK recommendation to the Caribbean is that with the EBA basically it's
what they're getting now is just about the best that they could get?
MM: Well a, a great deal of work went in to this. There were a lot of negotiations
which were done on that and, and we've worked very hard to get to this point and I think
now we need to continue to work on, on talking about these issues and making sure that we
do have competitive industries in the Caribbean.
Presenter: British Minister responsible for Caribbean Affairs, Meg Munn. She will
co-chair the UK - Caribbean Forum of Foreign Ministers in London next week when the EBA is
likely to be a discussion topic.
