House Moves Ahead, Scheduled to Consider GSP/ATPA Extension Bill This Week
According to the House leadership's weekly schedule, during the week of December 7, 2009, the House is scheduled to consider legislation to extend the Generalized System of Preferences Program (GSP) and the Andean Trade Preference Act/Andean Trade Promotion and Drug Eradication Act (ATPA/ATPDEA) beyond their December 31, 2009 expiration dates.
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The GSP/ATPA extension bill is scheduled to be introduced by House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Rangel (D).
If passed by the House as expected, it would then go to the Senate for passage. It is yet not known if the Senate will take up the House GSP/ATPA extension bill, introduce their own bill, etc.
(Last week, a trade source indicated that the House and Senate had not reached agreement on legislation to extend GSP and ATPA/ATPDEA. More recently, another source indicated that these House and Senate discussions may be focused on the length of a possible extension. Senate Finance Committee Chairman Baucus has previously predicted that GSP and the Andean trade preference programs would be extended before they expire on December 31, 2009 and that the extensions would be short-term, but longer than six months.)
(GSP (i.e., A, A*, and A) for most beneficiary countries, i.e., other than those listed as African Growth and Opportunity Act beneficiary countries, will expire on December 31, 2009, unless a law extending it is enacted. Similarly, the ATPA/ATPDEA is scheduled to expire on December 31, 2009 (for Colombia, Peru, and Ecuador).
Note that for AGOA beneficiary countries, both the GSP program (i.e., A, A*, and A) and the AGOA-GSP program (i.e., D) expire on September 30, 2015.)
House Majority Leader's schedule for week of December 7, 2009 available at http://www.majorityleader.gov/links_and_resources/whip_resources/weeklyleader.cfm?pressreleaseID=3629.