Reducing African freight costs, averaging 11.4 percent of cargo value, would facilitate U.S. trade in the region and save African about $11 billion per year, according to a report on U.S. trade with Africa released by the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (here). The USTR recommended a number of trade facilitation and other measures to bolster U.S. trade with Africa, as the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) by itself will not likely achieve “transformative changes” in trade and investment on the continent, the report says.
Officials from the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative have garnered widespread support from the financial services community for the Trans-Pacific Partnership, and are still working to resolve lawmakers’ concerns about biologics data protections in the agreement, Deputy U.S. Trade Representative Robert Holleyman said during a speech Sept. 20. To build further support for approval of the pact before the end of 2016, USTR officials have been “fanning out around the country” over the last month to make its case to different groups about “why trade matters,” which has generated grassroots support for the agreement, Holleyman said during an address at the International Bar Association conference in Washington. The pact brings strategic benefits for the U.S., which would foster closer economic ties with the Asia-Pacific region, the fastest-growing part of the world, as Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has emphasized, Holleyman added. “It’s our hope that, through that combination, through the broad understanding that members of Congress have had, as they’ve now seen this agreement for nearly a year, that they can now understand what it means for their homes, for their districts, and that we will have the support we need in Congress,” he said.
A World Trade Organization Appellate Body found in favor of the Obama administration’s challenge to Indian domestic content requirements that developers of solar products in that country use Indian-manufactured cells and modules, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative said (here). The appellate body rejected all of India’s defensive arguments, USTR said. India filed a notice of appeal April 20, after the WTO in February ruled in favor of the U.S. (see 1604220010). U.S. solar exports to India have dropped by more than 90 percent since the 2011 enactment of India’s National Solar Mission, USTR said. “Local content requirements are not only contrary to WTO rules, but actually undermine our efforts to promote clean energy by requiring the use of more expensive and less efficient equipment, making it more difficult for clean energy sources to be cost-competitive,” U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman said in a statement.
The U.S. and 12 other World Trade Organization members are jointly launching plurilateral negotiations in Geneva to ban subsidies for fisheries worldwide, 60 percent of which are being overfished, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative said (here). The members also plan a push for bolstering international standards regarding the reporting and transparency of fishery subsidies, as tens of billions of dollars in these subsidies contribute to overfishing and overcapacity, disadvantaging U.S. fishing industries, among other things, USTR said. Argentina, Australia, Canada, Chile, Colombia, New Zealand, Norway, Papua New Guinea, Peru, Singapore, Switzerland and Uruguay are joining the U.S. in this effort. "The United States has been a leader on this issue,” U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman said in a statement. “We are eager to join with similarly committed WTO Members to negotiate new rules that will help protect the marine environment and allow American fishermen and women to compete on a fair and level playing field." U.S. fishing industries in 2014 exported an estimated $5.8 billion in edible fish products around the world, USTR said.
U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman and EU Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom met in Brussels Sept. 15 to take stock of Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership negotiations, and will next meet for a formal discussion of the pact in New York on Oct. 3, the EU said (here). "We had a good meeting where we reviewed the substantial progress being made and discussed next steps for moving forward,” they said in a statement. “We have directed our teams to make as much progress as possible during the next round, scheduled for the week of October 3 in New York."
The U.S. filed a complaint at the World Trade Organization alleging that China provided subsidies in 2015 for domestic production of rice, wheat and corn, totaling $100 billion in excess of its commitments under WTO rules, U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman and Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced Sept. 13 (here). The policy bloats Chinese prices above normal market levels and constitutes an unfair incentive for Chinese farmers to boost production, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative said in a statement. “Through tariff cuts and the removal of other trade barriers, China has gone from a $2-billion-a-year market for U.S. agricultural products to a $20-billion-plus market,” Vilsack said in a statement. “But we could be doing much better, particularly if our grain exports could compete in China on a level playing field. Unfortunately, China’s price supports have encouraged wheat, corn and rice production in China that has displaced imports.” The policy has injured U.S. producers, who could meet Chinese import demand if China were to follow through with a WTO- and market-oriented agriculture trade policy, Vilsack added.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative is asking for input as it builds its 2016 Notorious Markets List (here). The list is an out-of-cycle review based off the annual Special 301 Report. The list identifies “online and physical marketplaces that reportedly engage in and facilitate substantial copyright piracy and trademark counterfeiting,” the USTR notice said. Those commercial areas include foreign trade zones, USTR said. The 2015 Notorious Markets List, published in December, identified counterfeit marketplaces across the globe (here). Comments are due by Oct. 7.
The U.S. should press the East African Community (EAC) to lower duties on recycled and used textiles, industry members said to the Trade Policy Staff Committee, an interagency group led by the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, during an Aug. 22 hearing on African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) eligibility. Among other issues discussed were the removal of the Republic of the Congo from the list of AGOA beneficiaries, and whether to keep Lesotho on the AGOA beneficiary list. The hearing was part of USTR's annual review of country eligibility for AGOA benefits in 2017.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative reviewed the government of Peru’s verification report of a 2015 timber shipment to the U.S., after USTR in February asked Lima pursuant to the U.S.-Peru Trade Promotion Agreement to provide documentation that the import complied with relevant Peruvian laws and regulations, the agency said (here). According to a report by the Interagency Committee on Trade in Timber Products from Peru (here), the Peruvian Supervisory Agency for Forestry and Wildlife Resources reported that "significant portions" of the 2015 shipment (see 1602290045) to the Port of Houston did not comply with Peruvian laws and regulations; for instance, some trees were harvested without authorization, USTR said. But the Peruvian government has adopted several programs to reform the country’s forest sector, the agency said. Among these activities are recently reported seizures of illegal timber, and the creation of an independent forestry oversight body, which has conducted more than 4,000 inspections of 1.7 million hectares from 2009 to June 2016 that yielded “thousands of resolutions” to sanction illegal activity or order corrective actions to improve forest management.
The interagency Trade Policy Staff Committee (TPSC) will conduct a public hearing on Oct. 5, and is seeking comment, to prepare its annual report to Congress on Chinese compliance with commitments made as part of its accession to the World Trade Organization, the TPSC said (here). The committee is asking potential testifiers to provide written notification and a summary of testimony by Sept. 21, and will accept public comments until then. Comments may be submitted pertaining to Chinese WTO commitments regarding trading rights, import and export regulation, internal policies affecting trade, intellectual property rights, services, rule-of-law issues and other WTO commitments, the TPSC said. The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative is also requesting that the public “specifically identify unresolved compliance issues” warranting review and evaluation by USTR’s China Enforcement Task Force. If necessary, the TPSC’s hearing will continue to Oct. 6.