Yerevan/Mediamax/. The first round of Armenia-EU talks on Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Area (DCFTA) kicks off in Brussels today.

“Changes in all spheres which are directly or indirectly connected with foreign trade will be made for the conclusion of the agreement - from procurement to customs administration,” Armenia’s chief negotiator, Deputy Economy Minister Garegin Melkonyan said in an interview with Mediamax.

“The package of reforms involves brining the Armenian economic model of regulation to European standards from normative and legal points of view,” the Deputy Minister said.

According to him, key issues to be discussed during the whole negotiation process will be the harmonization of the normative-legal base in agriculture and food safety, as well as tax and customs spheres with European standards. “If in terms of legislation we have almost the same approaches with the EU, then we have a lot to do in terms of administration. In particular, EU is very attentive about determining customs values which have to be brought in line with European standards,” said Garegin Melkonyan.

Speaking about the terms of negotiations on DCFTA, he said that the process will last 2-3 years. “The last country to have signed the agreement on free trade area with the EU was South Korea. DCFTA is a relatively new thing for the EU and the first country to have negotiated in this direction was Ukraine. The negotiation process lasted a little more than 2 years and is practically over,” said Garegin Melkonyan, adding that parallel to Armenia EU conducts negotiations on DCFTA with Moldova and Georgia.

The Deputy Economy Minister expressed the opinion that the process won’t meet strong domestic resistance. “There might be some difficulties in a number of areas, but on the whole the package should be considered as a process for bringing the whole economic system in line with European standards. Reforms may seem to be painful but the result will be undoubtedly positive,” said Garegin Melkonyan.