ASA Says WTO Agreements Will Hurt U.S. Exports
Agreements that emerged from the WTO Ministerial Conference in Nairobi last week will undercut U.S. exports and distort trade, because they allow developing countries to use marketing, processing, and transportation subsidies for exported commodities until 2023, the American Soybean Association said (here). ASA echoed statements made this week by Agriculture Chairman K. Michael Conaway, R-Texas, who said that the agreed 8-year period during which developing countries may provide subsidies runs counter to the U.S. position that the authority for these subsidies expired in 2004, at the end of the implementation period for the Uruguay Round commitments (here). “The agreement reached in Nairobi at least assigns a definitive date to ending these subsidies,” Conaway said in a statement. “But, the success of this aspect of the agreement will ultimately be measured by its rigorous and full enforcement.”
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
If your job depends on informed compliance, you need International Trade Today. Delivered every business day and available any time online, only International Trade Today helps you stay current on the increasingly complex international trade regulatory environment.
Yet ASA also voiced support for the Nairobi agreement’s language providing for the immediate elimination of export subsidies by developed countries, and noted that the agreement imposes a “relatively short” period for developing countries to eliminate non-Article 9.4 export subsidies. The agreement calls for developing countries to cancel these subsidies in 2018. Article 9.4 allows developing countries to subsidize marketing and internal transportation costs.
“On balance, we are disappointed in the Nairobi results,” ASA President Richard Wilkins said. “We recognize that U.S. negotiators faced a very difficult environment in which to make progress. The only silver lining to this agreement will be if future WTO negotiations truly take place on a new, sounder foundation that is based on the acceptance of greater disciplines by all parties. ASA will continue working with other U.S. farm and commodity groups, the Administration, and the Congress to insist that this be the case.”