(adds Oxfam reaction)

By Ingrid Melander

BRUSSELS, April 4 (Reuters) - The European Union pledged on Wednesday to fully open the bloc's wealthy markets to imports from former colonies in a move aimed at helping producers of goods ranging from fruit to meat.

The bloc's executive European Commission said the step would take effect when agreement had been reached in continuing trade talks with nearly 80 African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries, with transition periods for rice and sugar.

"By removing all remaining tariffs and quotas for all ACP countries we will create the best possible opportunities for these economies," EU Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson said.

But aid advocacy group Oxfam said it was "the least the Commission needed to do", as it had already pledged to improve market access for poor countries. It urged the EU executive to give them more time to negotiate the new deal.

"Today's offer by the EU provides some answers to legitimate ACP concerns. However, it is made as part of the negotiation of Free Trade Agreements, which are fraught with problems," it said in a statement.

Most exports from the ACP countries, many of them former European colonies, are already entering the EU tariff-free.

But a waiver from the World Trade Organisation for those preferential trade deals expires at the end of this year. Trade talks for a replacement deal have made little progress so far.

The new offer will make a difference for the roughly 30 most developed countries among the ACP group, which currently pay tariffs on fruit, vegetables, cereals and beef, a spokesman for the EU's executive Commission said.

PRESSURED?

There currently are quotas on bananas, sugar and rice for these countries, the spokesman said.

South Africa will not fully benefit from the offer, the Commission said, as it would still have to pay import duties on a number of agricultural products.

The dismantling of tariffs and quotas would apply immediately with the entry into force of the new agreement, except for rice and sugar, the EU executive said.

ACP rice exports would become tariff-free after a small number of years yet to be decided, the European Commission said. Sugar exports would become duty- and quota-free in 2015.

The EU is asking ACP countries in the trade talks to open their own markets to EU exports by dismantling their tariffs and quotas. That will be done progressively, with transition periods of up to 25 years, the European Commission said.

The EU, which calls itself the world's largest aid donor, has promised more than 22 billion euros for ACP countries for 2008-2013, including 2 billion euros a year from 2010 in aid-for-trade to help them adapt to opening their markets.

African countries have said they want more, to compensate for the loss of tariff revenues in the future deals and to help their products meet the standards to enter the EU market.

Some ACP states are concerned about the extent to which the EU wants them to open up their economies to European imports, and have said it would be hard for them to sign a deal in time.

Oxfam signalled what it saw as a risk that former colonies could feel pressured by the EU's new move into agreeing to opening up their economies to European goods.

"This mustn't be used as a way to bribe ACP countries into signing deals by the end of year," it warned.

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