Awaiting Parliament 1st reading / single reading / budget 1st stage
2013/2989(RSP) EU-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement negociations
Lead committee dossier: INTA/7/14733
Legal Basis RoP 115-p5
| Role | Committee | Rapporteur | Shadows |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lead | INTA | ZAHRADIL Jan (ECR) |
Legal Basis RoP 115-p5
Activites
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2014/04/17
Debate in plenary scheduled
Documents
| Amendments | Dossier |
| 59 |
2013/2989(RSP)
2014/01/27
INTA
59 amendments...
Amendment 1 #
Recital A A. whereas the rule-based multilateral trading system, established through the World Trade Organisation (WTO), is the most suitable framework for regulating and promoting open and fair trade
Amendment 10 #
Recital I I. whereas both negotiating Parties should join forces to ensure and promote legal trade in medicines (both princeps and generics) in compliance with the provisions of the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights and its flexibilities;
Amendment 11 #
Recital J J. whereas both negotiating parties should continue complying with existing WTO rules and their respective commitments in order to avoid recourse to the WTO dispute settlement mechanism and trade defence instruments, and should agree on an effective bilateral safeguard clause or equivalent mechanism to adequately protect their respective vulnerable industries against injury or threat of injury as a result of a surge in imports, especially in their respective sensitive sectors, which an adequate impact assessment, which also includes impact on human rights, would help identify;
Amendment 12 #
Paragraph 1 1. Welcomes the on-going progress in the FTA negotiations, in particular in the chapters on customs and trade facilitation, on technical obstacles to trade and on competition, and the Commission's regular debriefing with the European Parliament (hereafter EP) on their state of play
Amendment 13 #
Paragraph 1 1.
Amendment 14 #
Paragraph 1 a (new) 1a. Is of the strong opinion that respect for workers´ and trade union rights must be a key feature in all trade agreements the EU signs with third countries; insists therefore that the ratification and subsequent implementation of all ILO core conventions, particularly Convention No 87 and No 98, must be a prerequisite for continuing the negotiations for a possible free trade agreement between the EU and Vietnam; calls on the Vietnamese government to live up to all its obligations under the core ILO conventions it has ratified and to ratify and implement the outstanding core conventions without further delay; reiterates that workers´ and trade union rights must be universal and applied to all workers, including those in the Special Economic Zones;
Amendment 15 #
Paragraph 2 Amendment 16 #
Paragraph 2 a (new) 2a. Calls on both negotiating parties to fully respect their WTO commitments, eliminating any WTO-incompatible measures, and to build further on those commitments so as to achieve an ambitious agreement;
Amendment 17 #
Paragraph 2 a (new) 2a. Is appalled by past statements made by the European Chamber of Commerce (EuroCham) in Vietnam, threatening to withdraw European investment in the country if minimum wages are raised, notes that similar statements have been made by the Foreign Business Association in Vietnam in relation to environmental regulations and labour regulations that would improve working conditions; is of the opinion that all workers, including women and migrant workers and those working in the Special Economic Zones, must be entitled to receive at least the legal minimum wage; insists that European companies operating in Vietnam should by no means attempt to undermine increases in the legal minimum wage;
Amendment 18 #
Paragraph 2 b (new) 2b. Calls on the European Council and Commission to introduce mandatory and enforceable provisions on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), based on the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises and the UN guiding principles on business and human rights as well as on the UN Principles for Responsible Investment and Reporting, into a possible future FTA with Vietnam; calls on the Commission to establish an effective monitoring scheme with regard to Corporate Social Responsibility that involves trade unions and other civil society stakeholders;
Amendment 19 #
Paragraph 3 3. Appreciates the positive prospects highlighted in the scoping paper which shows that the FTA would increase overall exports and imports for both the EU and Vietnam and provide opportunities for further FDI flows; calls therefore for
Amendment 2 #
Recital B B. whereas the negotiating directives of the European Commission (hereafter the Commission) for the EU-Vietnam FTA are attached to the Council's authorisation of 23 April 2007 to enter into negotiations for a Free Trade Agreement with countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and follow on the endorsement by the Council of the scoping paper which outlines the common objectives of both negotiating Parties, namely to intensify
Amendment 20 #
Paragraph 4 4. Stresses however that the objective for industrial trade should be reciprocal full duty elimination, with a certain degree of asymmetry in timing, and that any possible exception to this objective should be limited and subject to review
Amendment 21 #
Paragraph 4 4. Stresses however that the objective for industrial trade should be reciprocal full duty elimination
Amendment 22 #
Paragraph 4 a (new) 4a. Calls for a simplification of EU rules of origin - without lessening the strictness of the current system - in order to make them easier to apply for economic operators and customs administrations and to allow Vietnam to derive the full benefits from tariff elimination;
Amendment 23 #
Paragraph 5 5. Urges both negotiating Parties to respect each other’s right to regulate, including on the provision of public services, and to ensure that their respective regulations do not hamper bilateral trade with unjustified NTBs; calls therefore on both the EU and Vietnam to develop effective mediation disciplines to prevent the emergence of un
Amendment 24 #
Paragraph 5 a (new) 5a. Considers that particular attention should be given by the Commission to ensure that the benefits of the future agreement would encompass strong and enforceable controls measures to guarantee that the benefits of the agreement would favour only the EU and Vietnamese producers in full respect of the preferential rules of origin that would be negotiated;
Amendment 25 #
Paragraph 5 a (new) 5a. Considers that particular attention should be given by the Commission to ensure that the benefits of the future agreement would encompass strong and enforceable controls measures to guarantee that the benefits of the agreement would favour only the EU and Vietnamese producers in full respect of the preferential rules of origin that would be negotiated;
Amendment 26 #
Paragraph 5 a (new) 5a. Emphasizes the importance of promoting a strong public sector; insists to refrain from further liberalisation and privatisation of the public sector, in particular with regard to essential public utilities, such as water, water distribution, health, public transport and waste collection as those have been proven to have adverse effects on employees and users of public services; believes therefore that the public procurement sector in Vietnam should not be subject to further liberalisation but be used as a means to support sustainable development, requiring transparency and democratic control of the public procurement sector;
Amendment 27 #
Paragraph 6 6. Recognises that Vietnam has offensive interests in the liberalisation of Mode 4 in the General Agreement on Trade in Services and the conclusion of Mutual Recognition Agreements recognising the professional qualifications of nationals of Vietnam and of the EU, and that the EU has offensive interests in the liberalisation of market access and national treatment under Mode 1, 2 and 3 in most services; is of the view that addressing EU's offensive interests is an imperative to permit under Mode 4, temporary stays of necessary skilled professionals
Amendment 28 #
Paragraph 7 7. Calls on the EU and Vietnam to agree in the FTA on a fair and equitable treatment (FET) of all investors and services providers
Amendment 29 #
Paragraph 7 7. Calls on the EU and Vietnam to agree in the FTA on a fair and equitable treatment of all investors and services providers in the banking, insurance, legal, accounting, transport, distribution, wholesale and retail sector services; recalls that as regards financial services, it is also essential to ensure adequate supervision thereof to reduce systemic risk and provide the highest possible level of consumer protection as well as to enforce fair competition rules and practices between domestic and foreign investors and services providers, amongst other, by reducing, if not fully eliminating existing equity caps and abolishing restrictions on establishment and licence acquisition;
Amendment 3 #
Recital D a (new) Da. whereas the EU and Vietnam have a well-developed bilateral Human Rights Dialogue; whereas, however, this has not helped prevent a recent deterioration of human rights' protection in Vietnam; whereas human rights should be treated as an essential element of EU's trade policy; whereas the EU is committed, in the framework of the EU strategic Framework and Action Plan on human rights and Democracy, to carrying out Human Rights Impact Assessments for all FTAs and investment agreements;
Amendment 30 #
Paragraph 7 7. Calls on the EU and Vietnam to agree in the FTA on a fair and equitable treatment of all investors and services providers in the banking, insurance, legal, accounting, transport, distribution, wholesale and retail sector services; recalls that as regards financial services, it is also essential to ensure adequate supervision thereof to reduce systemic risk and provide the highest possible level of consumer protection as well as to enforce fair
Amendment 31 #
Paragraph 7 7. Calls on the EU and Vietnam to agree in the FTA on a fair and equitable treatment of all investors and services providers in the banking, insurance, legal, accounting, transport and retail sector services; recalls that as regards financial services, it is also essential to ensure adequate supervision thereof to reduce systemic risk, fight money laundering and provide the highest possible level of consumer protection as well as to enforce fair competition rules and practices between domestic and foreign investors and services providers, amongst other, by reducing, if not fully eliminating existing equity caps and abolishing restrictions on establishment and licence acquisition;
Amendment 32 #
Paragraph 8 8. Strongly encourages Vietnam to develop appropriate data protection legislation to achieve the status of a country with an adequate level of protection, yet without creating obstacles to the use of the flexibilities of the Agreement on Trade- Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, thereby allowing or enabling the transfer of personal data from the EU on the basis of and in compliance with EU legislation, thus boosting bilateral data flow and trade in related services such as e- commerce;
Amendment 33 #
Paragraph 9 9. Calls on the Commission and the Vietnamese authorities to negotiate effective and transparent procurement systems to ensure fair competition
Amendment 34 #
Paragraph 9 9. Calls on the Commission and the Vietnamese authorities to negotiate effective and transparent procurement systems to ensure fair competition when awarding public contracts to private or state-owned enterprises (SOEs), and to ensure the broadest possible coverage,
Amendment 35 #
Paragraph 9 a (new) 9a. Calls on the Commission authorities not to forget that Vietnam remains an economy ruled through government plans, the implementation of which favours a wide span use of number of subsidies, preferences and beneficial conditions to local State Owned Enterprises (SOEs) and local companies that biases competition with European companies, in particular in the sectors that are of importance for the export policy of Vietnam. The European Parliament urges Commission to ensure a strict reduction and supervision of the use of such subsidies in order to force SOEs to obey by market rules;
Amendment 36 #
Paragraph 9 a (new) 9a. Calls on the Commission authorities not to forget that Vietnam remains an economy ruled through government plans, the implementation of which favours a wide span use of number of subsidies, preferences and beneficial conditions to local State Owned Enterprises (SOEs) and local companies that biases competition with European companies, in particular in the sectors that are of importance for the export policy of Vietnam. The European Parliament urges Commission to ensure a strict reduction and supervision of the use of such subsidies in order to force SOEs to obey by market rules;
Amendment 37 #
Paragraph 10 10. Considers that particular attention is to be given in the FTA to the development of
Amendment 38 #
Paragraph 10 a (new) 10a. Calls on both negotiating Parties to secure in the Free Trade Agreement the implementation and enforcement of intellectual property rights; including patents and designs, also those related to medicines and trademarks, copyright and similar rights, geographical indications including marks of origin for agricultural and foodstuff products;
Amendment 39 #
Paragraph 11 11. Considers that the FTA should respect sensitivities linked to trade in agricultural and fisheries products, but that this should not prevent market opening in areas of complementarity, and underlines that new market access shall be subject to a thorough enforcement of intellectual property protection, geographical indications and sanitary and phytosanitary measures (SPS);
Amendment 4 #
Recital E a (new) Ea. whereas the FTA could help Vietnam diversify its economy and move up the value chain; whereas however there are no independent trade unions in Vietnam and workers' demonstrations are still heavily sanctioned, while forced resettlement of population is a frequent practice; whereas trade and investment liberalisation therefore runs the risk of exacerbating fundamental human right violations and the vulnerabilities of some categories of people, such as ethnic and religious minorities;
Amendment 40 #
Paragraph 11 11. Considers that the FTA should respect sensitivities linked to trade in agricultural and fisheries products, but that this should not prevent market opening in areas of complementarity, and underlines that new market access shall be subject to a thorough enforcement of
Amendment 41 #
Paragraph 11 11. Considers that the FTA should respect sensitivities linked to trade in agricultural and fisheries products, but that this should not prevent
Amendment 42 #
Paragraph 11 11. Considers that the FTA should respect sensitivities linked to trade in agricultural and fisheries products, but that this should not prevent full market opening, including tariff elimination in areas of complementarity, such as wines and spirits, and underlines that new market access shall be subject to a thorough enforcement of intellectual property protection and sanitary and phytosanitary measures (SPS);
Amendment 43 #
Paragraph 11 – point a (new) (a) recalls the importance of respecting the WTO commitments in the spirit of trade liberalisation, and simultaneously underlines that any WTO-inconsistent practices should be abandoned before concluding the FTA negotiations
Amendment 44 #
Paragraph 11 a (new) 11a. Stresses that IPRs should only be enforced in such cases where IPR infringements would directly have damaging and detrimental effects on patients´ health; insists that nothing in the agreement must hamper access to affordable generic medicines; underlines that the protection of geographical indications should be pursued in the interests of small producers and consumers;
Amendment 45 #
Paragraph 11 a (new) 11a. Urges the Commission achieving a good outcome as regards the liberalization of trade in manufacturing also by ensuring strict implementation and enforcement of intellectual property rights, including patents and designs, trademarks, copyright and similar rights for manufactured goods;
Amendment 46 #
Paragraph 11 a (new) 11a. Urges the Commission achieving a good outcome as regards the liberalization of trade in manufacturing also by ensuring strict implementation and enforcement of intellectual property rights, including patents and designs, trademarks, copyright and similar rights for manufactured goods;
Amendment 47 #
Paragraph 12 12. Asks for a transparent and effective state-to-state dispute settlement and where applicable provisions on investor-to-state
Amendment 48 #
Paragraph 12 12. Asks for a transparent and effective state-to-state dispute settlement
Amendment 49 #
Paragraph 12 a (new) 12a. Requests the inclusion of animal welfare standards in the chapter on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures;
Amendment 5 #
Recital F a (new) Fa. whereas the garment and textile industry does not only constitute Vietnam´s largest single source of formal sector employment with a direct labour force of more than two million workers but is also its largest export sector; whereas the electronics assembly sector, another leading export manufacturing sector, employs approximately 120,000 workers;
Amendment 50 #
Paragraph 12 a (new) 12a. Calls on the European Commission to refrain from including an investor-state dispute settlement mechanism (ISDS) into a possible future free trade agreement between the EU and Vietnam and supports the right to regulate in the general interest of society;
Amendment 51 #
Paragraph 12 a (new) 12a. Requests to include an 'international obligation clause' in the agreement, which provides that obligations regarding the protection of investment must be read subject to all parties' obligations under international treaties and customary international law, in particular concerning human rights, labour rights and the protection of the environment; requests therefore that an investment agreement should not curtail progress in ratifying and fully implementing international human rights, ILO Conventions and multilateral environmental agreements by both Parties;
Amendment 52 #
Paragraph 12 a (new) 12a. Calls upon the negotiating parties to eliminate WTO-inconsistent measures prior to the conclusion of the FTA negotiations.
Amendment 53 #
Paragraph 13 13. Expects the FTA to include a binding and enforceable sustainable development chapter reflecting EU and Vietnam's common commitment to promote respect for, compliance with, and enforcement of, international human rights, the eight ILO's core conventions and key multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs),
Amendment 54 #
Paragraph 13 13. Expects the FTA to include a binding and enforceable sustainable development chapter reflecting EU and Vietnam's common commitment to
Amendment 55 #
Paragraph 14 14.
Amendment 56 #
Paragraph 14 14. Commends the socioeconomic progress made by Vietnam as part of its Doi Moi reform, and supports its continued efforts
Amendment 57 #
Paragraph 14 a (new) 14a. Calls on the Commission to apply an approach based on conditionality so as to offer the signature of the FTA in exchange of concrete progress on human rights and other fundamental rights;
Amendment 58 #
Paragraph 15 a (new) 15a. Considers that the Trade Sustainability Impact Assessment carried out in view of the EU-ASEAN FTA negotiations is outdated; reminds that the Commission has taken commitments in the framework of EU strategic Framework and Action Plan on human rights and Democracy; urges the Commission to carry out as soon as possible a Human Rights Impact Assessment as requested by the European Parliament in its Resolution on Human Rights and Social and Environmental Standards in International Trade Agreements of 25 November 2010 (2009/2216/INI) to provide for "comprehensible trade indicators based on human rights and on environmental and social standards" and also in line with the guidance prepared by the UN rapporteurs on the right to food which calls for the use of Human Rights Impact Assessment ("Guiding Principles on Human rights Impact Assessment of Trade and Investment Agreements");
Amendment 59 #
Paragraph 15 a (new) 15a. Insists that a strongly worded chapter on sustainable development, laying down the highest possible social, environmental and labour standards is of utmost importance and therefore needs to be an integral, binding and enforceable part of a possible future FTA with Vietnam and must include concrete provisions to review the agreement, depending on possible adverse effects of the agreement in the area of environmental protection, labour and social rights; believes that an up to date and independent ex-ante Sustainable Impact Assessment (SIA) of the possible positive as well as negative impacts of such an agreement is necessary before an agreement can be concluded; is of the opinion that additionally, an independent ex-ante Human Rights Impact Assessment is needed as well as concrete provisions on mechanisms to review the agreement on the basis of an ex-post Human Rights Impact Assessment that evaluates the impact of obligations arising from the agreement such as liberalisation provisions, intellectual property provisions and investment provisions; insists that on the basis of the findings of such an impact assessment, the agreement can be suspended, amended or abandoned;
Amendment 6 #
Recital F b (new) Fb. whereas Vietnam has so far only ratified 5 of the 8 core ILO conventions; whereas it has not ratified ILO convention No 87 on Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organize, No 98 on the Right to Organize and Collective Bargaining and No 105 on the Abolition of Forced Labour; whereas all core ILO conventions are reported to be regularly violated, particularly in the Special Economic Zones;
Amendment 7 #
Recital F c (new) Fc. whereas forced and child labour, including forced trafficking of minors from rural areas into urban centres, have been reported to be a regular occurrence in Vietnam´s garment industry; whereas this goes largely unchecked and is aggravated due to the government of Vietnam´s severe restrictions vis-à-vis the right of civil society in general and trade unions in particular to organise;
Amendment 8 #
Recital H H. whereas both negotiating Parties expect to secure significant benefits from the elimination of both tariffs and non-tariff barriers to trade (NTBs), and whereas both Parties should aim at achieving a good outcome as regards the liberalisation of trade in services and of establishment, suitable and effective protection, implementation and enforcement of intellectual property rights, including patents and designs, trade or service marks, copyright and similar rights, geographical indications including marks of origin for agricultural and foodstuff products
Amendment 9 #
Recital H H. whereas both negotiating Parties expect to secure significant benefits from the elimination of both tariffs and non-tariff barriers to trade (NTBs), and whereas both Parties should aim at achieving a good outcome as regards the liberalisation of trade in services and of establishment,
source: PE-528.032
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2014-04-21Show (1) Changes | Timetravel
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