The National Pork Producers' Legislative Action Conference made advocating for market access in Vietnam one of its top three priorities, the trade group said April 14. The NPP Council urged farmers to ask their representatives to sign onto a letter led by Reps. Ron Kind, D-Wis.; Darin LaHood, R-Ill; Dusty Johnson, R-S.D.; and Jim Costa, D-Calif. That letter, sent to U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai, asks, "While you discuss the full range of trade issues with Vietnam, including those subject to Section 301 investigations, please consider pressing for further market access for U.S. pork."
U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai heard from 16 unions, UNITE HERE and the AFL-CIO on their wish for the U.S. to drop its opposition to a Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) agreement waiver for COVID-19 vaccines (see 2102260053). In a readout of the April 13 online meeting, the agency said: “Ambassador Tai reiterated that the Biden-Harris Administration’s top priority is saving lives and ending the pandemic in the United States and around the world. The Ambassador conveyed the Administration’s commitment to increasing Covid-19 vaccine production and distribution, both at home and worldwide.”
U.S.-China Business Council President Craig Allen, former deputy assistant secretary for China in the State Department, said that the Chinese were taken by surprise by how little has changed in the new administration. “There was an expectation between [Donald] Trump and [Joe] Biden, there would be a loosening of technology regulations,” he said, but Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo has taken steps to tighten export restrictions that affect Huawei, and there have been actions under the new Information, Communications and Telecommunications Services (ICTS) regulations.
Toasts not Tariffs, a coalition of 48 trade groups in the liquor and wine industries, restaurants and retailers, wrote to the commerce and agriculture secretaries and the U.S. trade representative to urge them to convince the European Union and the United Kingdom to lift 25% tariffs on U.S. whiskey exports. The April 12 letter did not mention that those tariffs were in response to 25% tariffs on steel exports from the EU and the U.K., and that lifting the tariffs on steel would end tariffs on whiskey.
European Union Trade Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis, in a Der Spiegel interview published April 10, said that the EU has offered to lift its retaliatory tariffs in response to 25% tariffs on EU steel and 10% tariffs on EU aluminum, while they try to resolve the overcapacity problem. “We have proposed suspending all mutual tariffs for six months in order to reach a negotiated solution,” Dombrovskis said, according to the EU press office in Washington. “This would create a necessary breathing space for industries and workers on both sides of the Atlantic,” he said.
The U.S.-Bangladesh Business Council aims to increase trade between the two countries, as Bangladesh is expected to graduate from the least-developed countries list by 2026. The U.S. is the largest importer of Bangladeshi products, and imported not quite $7 billion in 2019, according to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative. A launch program hosted by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce said that Bangladesh imported more than $1 billion in American agricultural products.
Bloomberg News is reporting that Sarah Bianchi, a senior managing director at Evercore ISI International, is being considered for deputy U.S. trade representative, according to anonymous sources. Bianchi, who once served as director of policy for Vice President Joe Biden, is still being vetted, the sources said. The story did not say which deputy job Bianchi would be put in, but a commissioner for the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission tweeted that she would be in charge of China.
Although many American liquor exports received a reprieve with the lifting of Boeing tariffs in Europe, bourbon and other American whiskeys continue to face a 25% punitive tariff in the European Union and the United Kingdom because of Section 232 tariffs on those countries' steel and aluminum exports. At the time the tariffs were imposed, Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., was majority leader, so the product choice was considered to create additional pressure on the administration to reverse the action.
Export Compliance Daily is providing readers with the top stories for March 29-April 2 in case you missed them. You can find any article by searching on the title or by clicking on the hyperlinked reference number.
U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai, in a video call April 1 with Vietnam's trade minister, Tran Tuan Anh, “highlighted the Biden Administration’s concerns about currency practices covered in the ongoing Section 301 investigation,” according to a readout of the call. In a tweet after the call, Tai said, “I ... urged Vietnam to address U.S. concerns on currency practices covered in the Section 301 investigation.” Tai said the two committed to increased collaboration, and plan to hold a meeting later this year under the Trade and Investment Framework Agreement “to assess progress made in strengthening the trade relationship and in resolving outstanding bilateral issues,” which also include agricultural market access, digital trade and illegal timber trafficking.