The European Union (EU) and former European colonies are negotiating new trade and investment agreements to replace preferential deals the World Trade Organization has ruled illegal and says must be scrapped by the end of the year.
Faced with the end of favorable market arrangements dating back decades, Africa is in a catch-22 situation.
Experts say long-term growth is at risk if the continent spurns a global trend towards liberalization, but its fragile industries are also threatened with closure if they do.
Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) will ensure continued tariff-free exports to Europe, but many Africans say the deals would, in turn, flood their markets with cut-price goods, killing domestic production.
Already, some African nations have felt that pinch because of an influx of cheap Chinese goods.
INFANT ECONOMIES
Across the continent, the examples of potential threats are myriad and especially dangerous for countries that lack diversity in their exports.
If EPAs are not in place by Dec. 31, affected African firms will face European import tariffs of at least eight percent. Other exports could face tariffs of between five percent and 25%.
Joel Bruneau, general manager of a Mauritius tuna processing firm employing about 2,000 people, is afraid of competition from countries vying for the European market if no deal is struck.
"Our industry is only in its infancy," he said.
In Kenya, flower growers who supply the EU with more than a quarter of its cut flower requirements, say any deal is better than nothing.
In Ghana, some analysts worry the EPAs will slash government revenue from import tariffs and allow an influx of European poultry that will hurt local chicken and grain farmers.
EU Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson says African, Caribbean and Pacific countries -- grouped into six trading blocs -- will lose out if they miss the December deadline.
With so much at stake, west African trade groups are racing to cut a deal by the deadline, said Guy M'Bengue, managing director of Ivory Coast's private sector export promotion body Apexci.
"We do not envisage a situation where we will not sign," he told Reuters. "The longer this is delayed the worse it is. The stakes are enormous."
Others are less optimistic. The west African trade bloc, ECOWAS, has said talks are likely to drag into 2008.
STOP-GAP AGREEMENT?
Campaigners accuse the EU of pressuring poor nations to sign without giving them room to discuss an alternative even though many of them lack the expertise to push their interests.
"It's a bit of a David and Goliath situation," said Laura Merrill, an Oxfam fair trade official in Nairobi.
She urges Africans to demand a stop-gap agreement to protect their industries until they are ready to sign the EPAs.
One temporary solution could be the General System of Preferences (GSP+) that allows countries to protect products on which their economies depend for an agreed period.
About a dozen Latin American and Asian producers benefit from GSP+ deals that let them export to Europe without dismantling the bulk of their tariffs.
"Ghana is very qualified for that," said Tetteh Hormeku, head of programs at Third World Network, a non-governmental organization in Ghana. "We would be able to export and we wouldn't need to remove tariffs on 80% of products."
Not all African countries stand to automatically lose their European markets on Jan. 1, in the absence of new pacts.
In fact, 33 out of the continent's 53 countries will still enjoy secured access under an "Everything But Arms" trade pact.
Nigeria, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Kenya and Mauritius are among the nations that do not fall under that category.
"We will never grow if our industries have open competition with those from Europe," said Isaiah Kipyegon, an official of the Norwegian Chu
