CARIFORUM and UK EPA Study

Finally, the services commitments made by The Bahamas, which were previously only appended to the Annexes outlining CARIFORUM’s schedules of commitments in the CF-EU EPA (i.e., Annexes IV E and F), have now been directly incorporated into a single CARIFORUM-wide Annex and schedule of commitments under the CF-UK EPA. Notwithstanding these relatively minor changes, however, with new regulations likely to be introduced by the British Government to manage its internal market over time, there may be a re shaping of the policy landscape into which CARIFORUM firms seeking market entry opportunities find themselves. In addition to this, the UK’s global trade policy agenda will also result in that country entering into new trade agreements, likely involving better terms and conditions of access than those which are currently available to CARIFORUM under the EPA. However, the existing MFN clause under the CF-UK EPA, will mean that the UK has to extend to CARIFORUM any improved terms and conditions of market access that it offers to its larger partners, which is designed to prevent any loss of preferential margins currently being enjoyed. An indirectly related consideration, also over time, relates to the effect of differences between the pace at which both the EU and the UK engage in third party trade agreements, coupled with the way in which these are internalized into the arrangements with CARIFORUM via the MFN clause. Consequently, with the EU expected to be engaged in external trade negotiations and agreements at a vastly different pace and scale than that of the UK, some divergences are likely to emerge over time between the market access conditions available to CARIFORUM services suppliers within the UK versus the EU markets. This may ultimately have an impact on the relative value placed on either market, with the CARIFORUM private sector’s related investment and other commercial decisions most likely being restructured along those lines. There are, however, a number of benefits for CF under the CF-UK EPA that are related to having only one set of internal regulatory requirements to surmount in gaining access to the UK market. It also clear from the available data that the UK is not only a more valuable services market compared to many of its EU counterparts, but is among the lowest ranked OECD countries in terms

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