East-West trade

Recommendation 430 (1965)

Author(s):

Parliamentary Assembly

Origin

Assembly Debate on 29th September 1965 (12th Sitting) (seeDoc. 1966, report of the Economic Committee). Text adopted by the Assembly on 29th September 1965 (12th Sitting).

The Assembly,

1. Noting the numerous signs of a more positive attitude in the Soviet Union and the other Eastern European countries as well as in the West in favour of expanding East-West trade and placing it on a more stable basis ;

2. Noting that trading conditions and trade interests vary in Eastern European countries as in Western countries ;

3. Noting the progress achieved at expert level in working through ideological differences towards a pragmatic approach to the real trade problems at issue between the economic systems of East and West ;

4. Believing that these issues can be further resolved by seeking to secure comparable and expanding market outlets on the basis of balanced concession without either East or West giving up the foundations on which their economic and social systems and their trade relations among each other rest,

5. Recommends the Committee of Ministers to urge member Governments :

to attempt to secure the binding, for longer periods i.e. five years or more, of mutual undertakings in East-West trade agreements in order to facilitate industrial investments and planning ;

to seek to obtain, on a quid pro quo basis, better opportunities for their traders to enter into direct contact with consumers in the Eastern European countries and to undertake market research ;

to establish regular exchanges of views and consultations with their other partners in OECD as well as in EEC and EFTA on East-West trade problems with a view to aligning their attitudes and modifying any practices on their side that unnecessarily frustate the development of East-West trade ;

to discuss the possibility of arranging, after the Kennedy Round, a new round of simultaneous bilateral negotiations with Eastern European countries within the framework of the Trade Development Committee of the Economic Commission for Europe of the United Nations, one object of which would be to seek to place payments arrangements on a multilateral basis.