Well, it looked good on paper. The European Union’s plan to replace expiring trade deals with the African-Caribbean-Pacific (ACP) group of former colonies envisaged ACPs banding together in regional blocs and signing collective “economic partnership agreements” (EPAs) with Brussels to enhance already privileged access to EU markets.

Instead, ACP suspicion of the EU’s motives and the usual cat-herding involved in negotiating with dozens of developing countries have resulted in last-minute scrambles to sign partial regional and bilateral deals, a tangled cat’s cradle if not a mangled dog’s breakfast.