Europe, Mexico to seek
new trade pact to deepen North American ties
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[May 11, 2015]
By Robin Emmott
BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The European Union and
Mexico will launch negotiations toward a new free-trade agreement later
this year, as Europe seeks to tie its economy closer to North America
following a deal with Canada and efforts to sign an accord with the
United States.
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Building on a pact with Mexico from 2000, the European Union hopes
to create a transatlantic free-trade zone and help set the global
rules of commerce before China does. Mexico is jumping ahead of
Brazil, whose talks toward a similar deal with the European Union
have stalled.
"We are ready to commit to a highly ambitious deal," EU Trade
Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom told a forum in Brussels alongside
Mexican Economy Minister Ildefonso Guajardo. "I will ask for a
mandate to launch negotiations this fall," she said.
EU officials are expected to discuss the timing of talks in more
detail at an EU-Latin American summit in Brussels on June 12, where
Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto is expected.
A deal, which would take several years, would upgrade the EU-Mexican
accord that was signed when the global economy was far less
integrated and online commerce was in its infancy. It is part of a
new generation of deals that go beyond tariffs.
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As with the EU's pact with Canada and its plans for a deal with the
United States, a new accord with Mexico would further open up
markets in services and allow businesses to bid for public tenders
in each others' countries.
The European Union is Mexico's second-largest trading partner after
the United States, while Mexico is a top destination for EU exports
after the United States and China.
A more comprehensive deal with the European Union would allow Mexico
to join Latin America's Pacific economies of Chile, Colombia and
Peru that now have modern trade pacts with both the European Union
and the United States.
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It also deepens a divide between those nations and Argentina, Brazil
and Venezuela on the Atlantic coast, which have been more reluctant
to drop barriers to trade.
"With Colombia, Chile and Peru, we are sending a signal of fresh air
that we are the countries of free traders. We are responsible for
more than half of Latin America's exports to the world," Economy
Minister Guajardo said.
The European Union and the South American trade bloc Mercosur have
been unable to agree a deal, with Brazil unwilling to move forward
without its close ally Argentina.
Mexico is also part of an Asia Pacific free trade agreement, the
Trans-Pacific Partnership, part of a broader U.S. strategy to link
its economy to fast-growing markets in the Pacific.
(Reporting by Robin Emmott; editing by Philip Blenkinsop)
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