U.S. negotiators will travel to Kenya to have talks under the Strategic Trade and Investment Partnership at the end of the month. "The negotiators last met in person under the STIP in October 2023 in Washington, DC, and have continued to make progress in deepening mutual understanding and resolving differences," the Office of U.S. Trade Representative said. The discussions will cover agriculture, good regulatory practices and workers' rights, it said.
South Dakota's two senators, Republicans Mike Rounds and John Thune, asked the USDA and the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative to begin talking to countries that are major poultry importers to make sure they will not put up trade barriers to vaccinated poultry, or to eggs laid by chickens vaccinated with a new avian flu vaccine.
After members of Congress were blindsided by the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative backing away from digital trade advocacy, they are taking no chances in spelling out their desire that the agency push for a continued moratorium on tariffs on digital goods. The World Trade Organization has renewed that moratorium since 1998, but some member countries want to start collecting duties on the sale of streaming movies, software as a service, and more.
India and the U.S. should aim for "economically meaningful outcomes" from better customs and trade facilitation, supply chain linkages, trade in high-tech products and trade in critical minerals between the two countries, India's commerce minister and U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai said in a joint statement.
McLarty Associates co-founder Nelson Cunningham has been nominated to replace Jayme White as deputy U.S. trade representative. White was responsible for negotiations in the Western Hemisphere, Europe and the Middle East, and also had some labor and environmental issues in his portfolio.
Greta Peisch is departing her job as general counsel in the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, and USTR Katherine Tai announced Juan Millan will serve as acting general counsel. The general counsel position must be Senate-confirmed.
In a report on how Russia is living up to its World Trade Organization commitments -- a report produced every other year for Congress -- the U.S. trade representative wrote that Russia has expanded import substitution to state-owned enterprises and private enterprises, including a ban on imported equipment.
Turkish duties on a host of U.S. products in retaliation for President Donald Trump's Section 232 steel and aluminum tariffs violate World Trade Organization commitments, a WTO dispute panel ruled Dec. 19. The panel said the duties violate articles I and II of the 1994 General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade and also found that the Section 232 duties are not "safeguards."
The U.S. will grant new Section 232 exclusions for steel and aluminum imports from the EU as part of a deal that will also extend the tariff rate quotas on EU steel and aluminum and avoid EU retaliatory tariffs on U.S. exports.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative moved Bryant Trick from acting assistant to assistant USTR for Europe and the Middle East, it said in a Dec. 11 news release. Prior to taking on the acting role in September, Trick, who has been at USTR for over 15 years, was deputy assistant USTR for Korea, USTR said.