ACP Trade Profiles

Over this time, it has come to be recognised that trade has the potential to make a significant contribution to pro-poor growth and the sustainable development of developing countries. This has been evidenced in a few developing countries, concentrated in East and South-East Asia, which experienced impressive economic growth over this period. Nevertheless, despite reform, not all developing countries have been the beneficiary of such growth.

The Africa, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) group of countries in particular has not been the beneficiary of such growth. The ACP is made up of 79 developing countries representing the gamut of classifications of developing countries; more than 50% of its members are Least Developed Countries, but there are also Highly Indebted Poor Countries, Net Food importing Developing Countries, Landlocked Developing Countries and Small Island Developing States.

For the ACP Group, this time has been a period of increasing marginalization. Not only has their market share failed to grow, but it has in fact declined to 20% of its level at the start of the period to account today for less than 2% of world trade. This decline has been combined with an ever-increasing reliance on international trade. While reliance varies widely within the group, all regions have a level of trade openness above the world average. The African continent possesses openness of 49%, while the Caribbean has an openness of approximately 80% and the Pacific has the highest level of openness at 114%. This openness means that these countries are particularly vulnerable to external shocks. Finally add to this dependence on a small number of commodities and the challenge faced by ACP countries begins to come into focus.

In the face of these challenges, ACP states have slowly begun to develop strategies to reverse their fortunes to date. African producers are slowing moving up the value chain away from total reliance on primary commodities and agricultural raw materials while the Caribbean and Pacific have launched forays in commercial services. For the majority of countries however, these initiatives are still in nascent stages. In addition, ACP producers have begun to diversify their export markets away from developed countries to include a greater role for intra-regional trade and trade with other developing countries. Again this trend is nascent. Intra-ACP trade for instance accounts for between a low of 0.1% and a high of 2% of trade flows of the various regions.

These profiles sketch the performance of ComSec ACP beneficiary countries. From them one can glean a snapshot of the current trading arrangements that obtain in a particular member country including inter alia statistical information, information on preferential trade agreements, and on the trade policy formulation process.