BALTIMORE -- U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai continued to throw cold water on the idea of reviving negotiations for a free-trade agreement with the United Kingdom, saying, "A free trade agreement is a tool. It is a very 20th century tool. It has its place certainly in the toolbox," she said, but said that she wants these U.K.-U.S. economic dialogues to be "maximally responsive" to today's trade challenges. She said she wants to make sure "that we don’t spend years and spend a lot of blood, sweat and tears working on something that isn't going to be relevant to the needs of our people or our economies."
The top trade official in the British government and U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai said they want to do even more trade and investment between the two countries, even as a free-trade agreement is not the end goal. Secretary of State for International Trade Anne-Marie Trevelyan had hoped that the Biden administration would continue the free trade negotiations started during the Trump administration, but that has not happened. Marjorie Chorlins, who leads the U.S.-U.K. Business Council at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, also spoke at the March 21 plenary in Baltimore, saying the business community strongly supports more U.S.-U.K. economic cooperation.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative announced that it has reached a compromise on a World Trade Organization intellectual property waiver for COVID-19 vaccines. According to a USTR spokesperson, no agreement on a precise text has been pinned down, but Reuters reported that the proposed agreement, the result of a compromise between the U.S., EU, India and South Africa, permits the use of "patented subject matter required for the production and supply of COVID-19 vaccines without the consent of the right holder to the extent necessary to address the COVID-19 pandemic."
Senators on the Finance Committee agreed that deepening trade ties with countries in Asia is important both for geopolitical and economic reasons, but they disagreed during a March 15 hearing on the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework about whether a traditional free-trade agreement is a better approach than the IPEF.
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Andrea Durkin, a former director for Central America in the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative during the George W. Bush administration, announced that she has returned to the office to be assistant USTR for the World Trade Organization and multilateral affairs.
The Senate voted March 10 to confirm Maria Pagan as deputy U.S. trade representative in USTR's Geneva office to serve as an ambassador to the World Trade Organization. Pagan joined USTR's staff in 2003, rising to deputy general counsel and aiding the agency across multiple administrations on a host of trade agreements and negotiations. Before joining USTR, Pagan was an attorney adviser in the Office of the Chief Counsel for International Commerce at the Commerce Department. During her confirmation hearing, Pagan said that reforming the WTO's Appellate Body is a top priority since the body's "overreaching has shielded China's non-market practices and hurt the interest of U.S. workers and businesses" (see 2111300063). She was confirmed by an 80-19 vote, with Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., not voting.
Michelle Schulz, a former member of the President's Export Council Subcommittee on Export Administration, rejoined the Braumiller Law Group as of counsel, the firm announced in an email. Schulz was one of the founders of the Braumiller Law Group, helping start the firm in 2003 when it was known as Braumiller Schulz. Schulz also served for a decade as a senior adviser to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative's Industry Trade Advisory Committee for Aerospace. Her practice deals with export controls, including matters under the International Traffic in Arms Regulations and Export Administration Regulations, along with Foreign Corrupt Practices Act cases and Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. regulations, the firm said.
David Boling, who was deputy assistant U.S. Trade Representative for Japan from 2015 until last month, and who negotiated on the U.S.-Japan mini trade deal and the Trans-Pacific Partnership, announced on LinkedIn that he recently joined Eurasia Group, where he is the director for Japan and Asia trade.
A new Canadian approach to dairy tariff rate quotas, which still sharply limits the retail sale of imports, drew fire from three U.S. dairy trade groups.