Trade negotiators from the world's poorest countries are seeking to overcome internal divisions before pressing the newly enlarged European Union for greater access to its markets at talks beginning on Thursday.
Faced with an EU that is unravelling links with former colonies and turning towards support for its 10 new members, Africa, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries met in Botswana on Tuesday needing to show rare unity to make real gains.
"This is a critical moment in our partnership with the EU," Botswana's Foreign Affairs Minister Mompati Merafhe told ACP ministers as he opened talks in the capital, Gaborone.
"We have to be assured that the enlarged EU is responsive to our concerns... We should not allow these negotiations to sow seeds of discord or disunity among us."
ACP countries are hoping for better access to Europe's massive internal market - particularly in agriculture - but also want infrastructure investment to help them deliver the goods. The EU has said it will give 13.5 billion euros ($16.25 billion) in development aid over five years.
"A lot of these countries can manufacture but they do not have the necessary capacity to take advantage of their own comparative advantage," said Garth le Pere, Executive Director of Johannesburg's Institute for Global Dialogue.
The two days of talks between ACP members and the EU aim to revise trade arrangements enshrined in the Cotonou agreement signed in Benin in 2000 that gives ACP producers ranging from Samoa to South Africa special access to EU markets and development aid.
Rather than agreeing one accord, the sides have agreed the EU will negotiate with six regional groups inside the ACP before a 2008 deadline, but analysts say the creation of separate accords will lead to division within the 79-member body.
Le Pere said Southern and East African nations bundled into the same region, but at different levels of development and with varying attitudes to free markets, lacked unity that weakened their collective voice.
"There is a suspicion and fear that the EU is taking advantage of divisions," said le Pere.
"There have been great problems between SADC (South African Development Community) and COMESA (Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa) in harmonising both the focus and the strategy of negotiations," said le Pere.
"COMESA is much more advanced in developing a free trade area... so agreeing the pace of liberalisation is a real problem."
Poul Nielson, the EU's development commissioner leading the European delegation, said last week that regional agreements offered a chance for greater trade within regions.
"They are not just an EU-ACP trade liberalisation process, but even more something that impacts directly and positively between the members of the regions," Nielson said.
He added that he would seek to re-allocate aid money not used by one country to others, a policy he admitted could test the solidarity of ACP nations.
Summing up the attitude of many African governments, Botswana's Trade Minister Jacob Nkate last week described the Cotonou agreement as one-sided, alluding to high European agricultural subsidies which price poorer competitors out of the market.
"It is favourable to the strong at the cost of the weak. Our desire is for a more equitable arrangement," he said.
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