Samoa Agreement: EU and its Member States sign new Partnership Agreement with the Members of the Organisation of the African, Caribbean and Pacific States

This article is brought to you in association with the European Commission.

The EU and its Member States signed today a new Partnership Agreement with the Members of the African, Caribbean and Pacific States (OACPS) that will serve as an overarching legal framework for their relations for the next twenty years. This agreement succeeds the Cotonou Agreement and will be known as the “Samoa Agreement”. The agreement covers subjects such assustainable development and growth, human rights and peace and security.

The denomination of the Agreement was agreed at the 46th session of the ACP-EU Council of Ministers, which took place right before the signature ceremony, also in Samoa.

The new Partnership Agreement lays down common principles and covers the following priority areas:

• human rights, democracy and governance
• peace and security
• human and social development
• inclusive, sustainable economic growth and development
• environmental sustainability and climate change
• migration and mobility

The agreement includes a common foundation, which applies to all Parties, combined with three regional protocols for Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific with a focus on the specific needs of each region.

The 27 EU member states and the 79 African, Caribbean and Pacific countries together represent around 2 billion people and more than half of the seats at the United Nations. With this new Agreement, the Parties will be better equipped to address emerging needs and global challenges, such as climate change, ocean governance, migration, health, peace and security.

Next steps

The provisional application of the Agreement will start on 1 January 2024.

The Agreement will enter into force upon consent by the European Parliament and ratification by the Parties, i.e. all EU Member States and at least two thirds of the OACPS Members.

Background

The ACP-EU partnership is one of the oldest and most comprehensive frameworks for cooperation between the EU and third countries.

The previous legal framework for the partnership, the Cotonou Agreement, was signed in 2000.

The post-Cotonou negotiations started in September 2018, under the leadership of Commissioner Neven Mimica, in the margins of the United Nations General Assembly in New York. The chief negotiators initialled the new Agreement in April 2021.

The Council adopted a decision on the signature and provisional application of the Agreement on 20 July 2023.

Quote(s)

This agreement is a landmark for EU’s external relations. The Samoa agreement brings together more than half of the UN members, from four continents, around shared priorities and interests. We are definitely moving away from the old paradigms and instruments that linked the EU to most of those countries into win-win partnerships that are fit for the current world. At a moment in time where multilateralism is in danger, the fact so many countries can come together and agree on joining forces to face global challenges opens a door for optimism.High Representative/Vice-President Josep Borrell

It is a great honour for us that the agreement can finally be signed during the Spanish Presidency of the Council, after years of work on both parts. The new Samoa agreement will help both sides to better address global challenges together and will reinforce bilateral cooperation in a wide range of aspects, from climate to peace and security, in the upcoming two decades. This is a difficult time for joint global action and multilateral approach. But this agreement shows that very large and diverse groups of countries can agree on concrete steps to deepen their partnership for building a joint future. It makes me and the European Union that I represent here hopeful.Pilar Cancela Rodríguez, Secretary of State for International Cooperation of Spain

I am satisfied that our long journey has come to a successful end with the signature of the Samoa Agreement. It will provide a modernised framework to revitalize our relations with the largest grouping of partner countries to provide a platform for dialogue and coordination to face the challenges of our times together. We will do everything to harness the collective power of our four regions. The EU and its Member States –as Team Europe – have launched ambitious investment packages under Global Gateway across all three regions and we push forward to implement these packages.Jutta Urpilainen, Commissioner for International Partnerships