The Caribbean Caribbean Community (Caricom) has postponed the scheduled September 2 signing ceremony for the Economic Partnership Agreement.

Caricom leaders are now expected to hold an emergency summit in Barbados in two weeks time to discuss the refusal of several Caricom members to sign the EPA with the European Union (EU). Caricom secretary general Edwin Carrington announced the change of plans on Thursday.

Carrington confirmed that on Wednesday Barbados Prime Minister David Thompson wrote Caricom Chairman Baldwin Spencer, the Prime Minister of Antigua and Barbuda, requesting an urgent meeting to discuss growing opposition to signing the EPA.

Guyana, Grenada and St Lucia have said they would delay signing the agreement, a free trade pact negotiated as a successor to the Cotonou Agreement between Europe and its former colonies in Africa, the Caribbean and Pacific (the ACP Group).

Carrington said that no date had been fixed for the special meeting, but it would most likely be held in Barbados.

“I would expect that the heads (of government) would respond positively,” he said, welcoming efforts to hold the special summit.

Spencer said that September 12 and 19 had been identified as possible alternative dates for the signing.

Economist Mary King, a strong opponent of signing the EPA, yesterday welcomed the postponement and the emergency summit meeting.

“I am very pleased,” she said.

She said that while she expected heads to make arguments for and against signing the EPA, “I am sure the arguments against signing will be far greater than any arguments for and I will assume that Caricom as a region will not sign.”

King had publicly said that the EPA is not good for either the country or the region. Guyana was the first Caricom member to say that it would not sign the EPA, saying that under it the EU threatens to impose higher tariffs on vital Guyanese exports like rice, rum and sugar.

This would result in a loss of billions of dollars in revenue and unfair trading advantage in the area of services, Guyana maintained.

“There is very little that we can send into Europe and this will negatively affect our balance of trade and our balance of payment,” Guyana President Bharrat Jagdeo had said.

Jagdeo said that the EPA would undermine the two-year old Caricom Single Market (CSM) because the region would be obliged to give priority to implementing the EPA.

The Guyanese leader further argued that the EPA had altered Caricom’s foreign trade policy by compelling the region to offer similar trade agreements to the US and Canada, and to give the EU the same treatment given to the large developing countries of India, China and Brazil.

“We have determined our foreign trade policy already for maybe decades to come by this agreement,” Jagdeo said, saying it leaves Caricom members and leaders little flexibility on foreign trade policy.