TNAG-0629-FCO40-777-Effect-of-GATT-Multi-Fibre-Arrangement-on-Hong-Kong-negotiat-1988 — Page 87

香港總督府

CONFIDENTIA

Die

L

Nick 121/(

KULEJEO W 2

145 1/2 1/16/16/1

7 SEP 1977

HOUSE

GOVERNMENT

HONG KONG

3rd September 1977

LAST

Howe

;

(161) (162)

MULTI-FIBRE ARRANGEMENT (MFA)

(16394).

In your letter of 20th May you suggested that we awaited developments within the Community and might let you have a memorandum for circulation nearer the time that the date for bilateral negotiatious came to be considered. We have now had a visit from Tran, the EEC Special Representative for textile negotiations, and I understand that the mandate will be considered very shortly.

2.

I am therefore enclosing a memorandum setting out what the implications may be for Hong Kong in the hope that FCO Ministers may be moved to prevent extreme courses. The main issues are set out in the

but not those in paragraphs 8 & 9 of this

Summary

letter.

3.

1200

As you may know we recently concluded a bilateral agreement under the MFA with the United States. This was much more restrictive than its predecessor and involved the freezing of quota levels in the first year and thereafter, though a notional 6% overall annual growth rate was envisaged, in practice the growth in sensitive items was very severely restricted. Though the trade here was shaken, the agreement was accepted as just defensible in the circumstances although a serious derogation from the spirit of the MFA.

4.

Ga

J

and I must that the

But Tran told us in confidence ask that his confidence be respected Commission was considering a mandate for bilateral negotiations with Hong Kong that would cut much deeper than the American agreement. They were envisaging a 'stabilisation of trade' not, as in the American agreement, on current quota levels for sensitive items, but at levels below even the current depressed level of trade

D.F. Murray Esq., CMG,