13 Amendments of Maria HEUBUCH related to 2018/2005(INI)
Amendment 4 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 1
Paragraph 1
1. Recalls that ODA alone is not sufficient to meet development needs and that the private sector can plays an essential role in the realisation of inclusive and sustainable development and the implementation of the 2030 Agenda; and stresses the need to rebalance trade and investment law with human rights law, notably in global supply chains;
Amendment 6 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 2
Paragraph 2
2. Recalls that human rights abuses committed by corporations have been a cause of serious concern for decades; Stresses that when acting in development, the private sector should abide by shared principles and common values, and that development objectives and effectiveness should prevail; to this end, encourages the EU and its Member States to pursue the adoption of a coherent framework establishing mandatory human rights due diligence requirements for European corporations, based on lessons learned from EU initiatives to regulate supply chains, such as the Conflict Mineral Regulation, the Timber Regulation and the legislation on illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing (IUU);
Amendment 10 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 3
Paragraph 3
3. Calls on the EU to ensure that its activities, both in the field of development and trade, promote and respect human rights; strongly encourages the EU to continue its work on operationalising its Rights Based Approach in all development activities and to set up a Task Force with Member States for this purpose; likewise, reaffirms the need to fully implement extraterritorial human rights obligations of EU Member States, as set out in the Maastricht Principles, and building on the various instruments of the Council of Europe, in particular the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR);
Amendment 15 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 3 a (new)
Paragraph 3 a (new)
3 a. Recalls that there is a profound asymmetry between Trans National Corporations’ rights and obligations, particularly in investment protection treaties, where investors are being granted broad rights, such as “fair and equitable treatment”, that are not matched by enforceable obligations in terms of compliance with human rights, labour and environmental law; strongly believes that a binding and enforceable UN Treaty on Business and Human Rights could address such imbalance;
Amendment 17 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 3 b (new)
Paragraph 3 b (new)
3 b. Warns against developing a double standard policy regarding the rights and obligations of corporations in investment and trade treaties; considering that the Commission has proposed to create a Multilateral Investment Court as a permanent body to enforce investor rights, stresses the importance of the EU being actively involved in the process of the Open-ended intergovernmental working group on transnational corporations and other business enterprises with respect to human rights (OEIGWG) and to uphold the primacy of human rights over trade interests;
Amendment 18 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 4
Paragraph 4
4. Underlines that trade is not an end in itself, but that an inclusive, free and fair trade policy aligned with the SDGs can contribute to poverty eradicationa tool to implement SDGs; stresses that global trade governance should enable trade integration that create real opportunities for sustainable inclusive development for all countries; points out, in this context, that the current Special Differential Treatment (SDTs) architecture in the WTO doesn’t deliver the anticipated results; stresses the need to make SDTs more effective and operational for developing countries; recalls the principle of policy coherence for development, requiring that the objectives of development cooperation be taken into account in policies that are likely to affect developing countries; calls on the EU to systematically evaluate the impact of its trade policies on developing countries; in particular, urges the EU to ensure that of its all investment and trade agreements include provisions for mandatory and independent ex-ante and ex-post human rights impact assessments, due diligence requirements and effective accountability mechanisms;
Amendment 26 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 4 a (new)
Paragraph 4 a (new)
4 a. Highlights that trade agreements can impact negatively on food security in developing countries; regrets that the two instruments proposed by developing countries in the remit of negotiations at the WTO to promote the livelihoods of small farmers, food security and rural development, namely Special Products (SP) and a Special Safeguard Mechanism (SSM) have not been established; calls on the EU to support developing countries' demands to protect their food production and to protect their population from the potentially destructive effects of cheap imports, including in the remit of Economic Partnership Agreements;
Amendment 29 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 4 b (new)
Paragraph 4 b (new)
4 b. Notes with concern that bilateral and regional free trade agreements (RTAs) contain provisions which are more stringent than those adopted at WTO, often covering areas not under WTO jurisdiction, and which place considerable restrictions on national governments;
Amendment 31 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 4 c (new)
Paragraph 4 c (new)
4 c. In particular, notes with concern that, while WTO Agreement on Agriculture (AoA) is already frequently criticized for not taking sufficient account of the needs of developing countries to pursue policies necessary to promote their food security and rural development, regional and bilateral FTAs, including EPA with ACP countries, require developing countries to reduce or eliminate their tariffs even further, thereby preventing developing countries from using the flexibilities in the WTO agreements;
Amendment 32 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 5
Paragraph 5
5. RHighlights that the proliferation of bilateral and regional free trade agreements (RTAs) create a problem for the coherence of global governance of trade and undermine the central role of WTO in setting global rules; against this background, reiterates the importance of the multilateral rules-based order as the most effective way to achieve an inclusive global trading system; emphasises the importance of comprehensive, binding and enforceable provisions on social, labour and environmental standards in trade agreements; deplores that the enforceability of social or environmental clauses attached to EU FTAs remains weak; welcomes the Commission’s commitment to include a chapter on Trade and Sustainable Development in all trade agreements; stresses that these provisions shall be binding, enforceable through effective monitoring and sanctions mechanisms that allow individuals and communities, outside or within the EU, to seek redress;
Amendment 44 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 6
Paragraph 6
6. Supports the establishment of a continental free trade area in Africa; stresses that Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) arcould potentially be an important instrument to promote sustainable development through trade, if accompanied by appropriate structural measures; but notes that despite year-long negotiations, only one complete Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) has been concluded until now; calls therefore on the EU and its Member States to acknowledge the difficulties encountered by developing countries related to EPAs in the Post-Cotonou process; in particular, stresses the need to conduct an in-depth analysis on their impact on African economies and their sub-sectors, their respective labour markets, and the promotion of intra-regional trade in Africa;
Amendment 52 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 6 a (new)
Paragraph 6 a (new)
6 a. Stresses the importance to adapt trade policies to support national efforts to combat climate change in order to comply with the Paris Agreement, which should be considered as an “essential clause” in all future EU trade agreements;
Amendment 55 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 6 b (new)
Paragraph 6 b (new)
6 b. Notes with concern that many difficulties remain to assess the relationship between trade and gender, due to a number of factors, including a lack of data; stresses the need to better understand the gender dynamics associated to trade agreements, which requires to use sex-disaggrated statistics in every single sector of the economy concerned;