Pacific
The EU’s relationship with the Pacific region has political, economic and development dimensions. The EU is the Pacific region’s second largest trading partner.
Australia and New Zealand are the EU’s like-minded partners, facing common geo-strategic challenges and promoting multilateralism and a global rules-based order. In June 2018, negotiations were launched for a comprehensive EU-Australia free trade agreement (FTA) and the fifteenth round of negotiations took place in April 2023. The EU signed an FTA with New Zealand in July 2023.
The EU has a partnership with the 15 Pacific Independent Island Countries that centres on development, fisheries and climate change, as well as partnerships with the three Pacific Overseas Countries and Territories and the Pacific Islands Forum.
Legal basis
- Title V (EU external action) of the Treaty on European Union (TEU);
- Titles I-III and V (common commercial policy; development cooperation and humanitarian aid; international agreements) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU);
- European Union-Australia Framework Agreement;
- European Union-New Zealand Partnership Agreement on Relations and Cooperation (PARC);
- Partnership Agreement between the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Group of States, and the European Community and its Member States.
The EU and the Pacific region
The EU and the Pacific region retain a long-standing relationship, shared values and strong economic and trade links. The EU has developed partnerships in the region with Australia, New Zealand, the 15 Pacific Independent Island Countries (PICs), the three Overseas Countries and Territories (OCTs) and the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF).
The EU, Australia and New Zealand are like-minded partners with common values and interests. The EU has developed close government and private-sector relations with both countries across a broad spectrum of issues, such as climate change and disaster risk reduction, rules-based world trade, security and development, technological research and human rights.
The EU’s relationship with the Pacific Islands has traditionally been based on development cooperation in the framework of the partnership between the EU and the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries. In recent years, this relationship has extended to other sectors such as the environment, good governance, energy, climate change, fisheries and human rights.
A. Australia and New Zealand
1. Australia
The EU and Australia have a long-established partnership that dates back to the 1960s. The basis of the current relationship is the 2017 EU-Australia Framework Agreement, focused on political dialogue, security issues, international cooperation, economy and trade, justice, culture and education, energy and the environment. The Agreement entered into force in October 2022.
Australia is an important trading partner for the EU. In 2022, the EU was Australia’s third largest two-way trading partner in goods, accounting for a total of EUR 56.4 billion. Australia is the EU’s eighteenth biggest trading partner and the EU’s main export categories are machinery and chemicals. Australia’s main exports to the EU are minerals, crude materials and manufactured objects.
Since 2018, the EU and Australia have been negotiating a comprehensive FTA, which would facilitate commercial exchanges between the two parties. The fifteenth and most recent round of negotiations took place in April 2023 in Brussels. The Australia-EU Leaders’ meeting took place in November 2022, focused on Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, the changing strategic outlook in the Indo-Pacific, the promotion of democracy, the rule of law, human rights and a rules-based multilateral order, climate change, the environment and biodiversity, the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals, human and labour rights, energy, digital transformation and other bilateral items.
2. New Zealand
EU-New Zealand relations are currently governed by the Partnership Agreement on Relations and Cooperation (PARC), which was signed in October 2016 and became effective in July 2022. The PARC facilitates bilateral engagement by strengthening political dialogue and improving cooperation on economic and trade matters and in a wide range of other areas, from innovation, education and culture to migration, counter-terrorism, the fight against organised crime and cybercrime, and judicial cooperation. The first Joint Committee following the PARC’s entry into force took place in February 2023, focused on foreign policy, especially in the context of Russia’s aggression against Ukraine and China’s expansion, security, trade, research and innovation, sustainable development, human rights and justice matters. Leaders welcomed the conclusion of negotiations for the FTA and New Zealand’s association to the Horizon Europe research programme and the signature of an agreement to exchange personal data. New Zealand and the EU agreed to deepen their cooperation on climate change, including through a High-Level Dialogue on climate and agriculture, within the International Strategic Agriculture Dialogue.
The EU is New Zealand’s third largest trading partner, after China and Australia. In 2022, two-way trade in goods between the EU and New Zealand amounted to EUR 9.1 billion. New Zealand’s main exports to the EU consisted of food and crude materials, while the EU’s principal exports to New Zealand were machinery and transport equipment.
After a 12-round negotiation process, initiated in 2018, the EU signed an ambitious FTA with New Zealand in July 2023. The agreement, set to create economic opportunities and uphold climate and labour standards, is awaiting Parliament’s approval. The Committee on International Trade (INTA) endorsed Parliament’s consent in October 2023, and the final Parliament Plenary decision will be in November 2023 in Strasbourg.
B. Other Pacific countries
The 15 Pacific Independent Island Countries (PICs)[1] have a combined area of 528 000 km² and are part of the African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States (ACP). The EU’s relations with the PICs are focused on development cooperation, fisheries and climate change.
The EU’s strategy vis-à-vis the PICs is set out in the 2012 joint communication entitled ‘Towards a renewed EU-Pacific development partnership’ and was updated by the EU strategy for cooperation in the Indo-Pacific in 2021. It builds on the framework of the Cotonou Agreement with the ACP countries. In December 2020, the EU and the Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States (OACPS), replacing the ACP Group of States, reached a political deal on the text for a new Partnership Agreement that will succeed the Cotonou Agreement. Key aspects of the new agreement will be cooperation on trade and investment, development and regionalisation. It will cover a large number of areas such as sustainable development and growth, human rights and peace and security with the aim of promoting regional integration. Once it has been ratified by all parties concerned, the agreement will serve as the new legal framework and govern political, economic and cooperation relations between the EU and 79 members of the OACPS for the next 20 years.
The signature is expected to take place in Samoa on 15 November 2023, in the presence of Commissioner Jutta Urpilainen.
The new Partnership Agreement is built on a common foundation, which sets out the values and principles that bring both parties together. In addition, it introduces three specific regional protocols for Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific with the aim of promoting regional integration. The regional protocols allow for the establishment of autonomous structures that will independently pursue relations with the EU and the three different regions involved. The agreement also envisages a strong parliamentary dimension with a permanent Joint Parliamentary Assembly fulfilling a clear consultative role. In addition, to reflect the strong regional dimension of the new agreement, it also includes three regional parliamentary assemblies, which will operate autonomously and have a clear consultative role. The position of the European Parliament has been expressed in three resolutions (4 October 2016; 14 June 2018 and 28 November 2019). Parliament welcomes the proposed overall architecture for future cooperation between the ACP and the EU and has reiterated the importance of strengthening the partnership’s parliamentary dimension. The EU-27 is the ACP-Pacific region’s fifth largest trading partner, with trade worth EUR 4 billion in 2022. The EU-Pacific EPA was ratified by Parliament in January 2011 and by Papua New Guinea in May 2011. The Government of Fiji started applying the agreement in July 2014. Samoa acceded to the agreement in December 2018 and has been applying it since then. Solomon Islands also acceded to, and started applying, the agreement in May 2020. Tonga declared its intention of acceding to the EPA in 2018. The negotiations are still ongoing.
The EU is the third largest donor of development assistance to the ACP-Pacific countries after Australia and Japan. The EU’s development assistance for the Pacific for the years 2021-2027 amounts to around EUR 750 million (including the OCTs).
The new Neighbourhood, Development and International Cooperation Instrument (Global Europe) has become the main funding instrument for EU cooperation and development with partner countries under the multiannual financial framework (MFF) for 2021 to 2027. It has integrated, inter alia, the EDF, which was previously outside of the EU budget. The EDF’s integration into the Union budget enhances the scrutiny powers of Parliament and helps strengthen the public legitimacy and political visibility of the EU’s external assistance as a whole.
The PICs face major development and climatic challenges. As regards climate change, the EU and the Pacific Small Island Developing States supported the establishment of the Paris Agreement at the 21st UN Climate Change Conference (COP 21) in 2015. The 23rd session (COP 23), which took place in Bonn, Germany, from 6 to 17 November 2017, was chaired by Fiji.
The Pacific Islands Forum (PIF), a political grouping of 18 members, is an interlocutor for the EU for EU development funding and trade negotiations. The grouping comprises: Australia, the Cook Islands, Micronesia, Fiji, Kiribati, Nauru, New Zealand, Niue, Palau, Papua New Guinea, the Marshall Islands, Samoa, the Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu, Vanuatu, New Caledonia and French Polynesia. New Caledonia and French Polynesia, together with Wallis and Futuna, make up the EU’s three Overseas Countries and Territories (OCTs) in the region.
Role of the European Parliament
Parliament’s relations with the Australian and New Zealand parliaments date back to 1979, when the Delegation for Relations with Australia and New Zealand (DANZ) was set up. Since then, the DANZ has engaged in regular interparliamentary meetings (IPMs) with the Australian and New Zealand parliaments to foster relations with the two countries and to discuss issues of common interest such as agriculture, energy, the environment and climate change, development and economic cooperation, science and technology, trade, the promotion of global and regional security in the Asia-Pacific region, countering terrorism, and human rights. The 42nd, and most recent, EU-Australia IPM took place in December 2022 in Brussels. Furthermore, Brussels also hosted the 27th EU-New Zealand IPM in February 2023.
Parliament is represented in its relations with the other Pacific countries by the Delegation to the ACP-EU Joint Parliamentary Assembly (DACP). The DACP joins its ACP counterpart in the assembly (ACP-EU JPA), which is composed of equal numbers of EU and ACP representatives. The main task of the delegation is to prepare the meetings of the ACP-EU JPA, to evaluate and follow up on Parliament’s activities, to organise meetings with high-level ACP figures, and to discuss topical issues relating to the implementation of the Cotonou Agreement and, in the future, the Samoa Agreement. The 42nd session of the ACP-EU JPA was held in Maputo, Mozambique on 29 October-2 November 2022, and was followed by the 43rd session in Brussels in June 2023. The first Joint Parliamentary Asssembly provided for under the Samoa Agreement is scheduled to take place in Luanda, Angola in February 2024.
Jonas Kraft