The World Trade Organization may have its first answer to what happens when a party appeals and there's no appellate body to resolve the dispute. The U.S., which killed the appellate body by not agreeing to appoint any replacements, is appealing a compliance report for a case in which India won the argument that the U.S. antidumping and countervailing case against Indian steel didn't fully follow trade law (see 14081205 and 1706090021).
The phase one trade deal (see 1912130035) between the U.S. and China has reduced Chinese “market uncertainty” and the two sides should cancel the remaining tariffs, a spokesman for China’s National Bureau of Statistics said during a Dec. 16 press conference. “It has strengthened market confidence and promoted economic and trade development, both for China and the United States, and for the world,” Fu Linghui said, according to an unofficial translation. “[It is] positive.” He also said the countries are continuing negotiations and should cancel “the levy of tariffs in stages, contributing more power to world economic growth.”
World Trade Organization members have again agreed to extend a moratorium on imposing customs duties on data transfers, the WTO said in a Dec. 10 press release. The moratorium, which has been renewed at every opportunity since 1998, will now remain in effect at least until the WTO’s 12th Ministerial Conference (MC12) in June 2020. WTO members, who were meeting as the WTO general council, also agreed Dec. 10 “to continue work under the existing 1998 work programme on e-commerce in the beginning part of 2020,” the release said. “The work in the run-up to MC12 will include structured discussions on issues that would help ministers take an informed decision by MC12.”
Even as Republicans and Democrats on the House Ways and Means Committee asked the Trump administration to keep the World Trade Organization appellate body functioning while it pushes for reforms, the American ambassador to the WTO said Dec. 9 that the administration will not support any appellate body nominations, even as other countries agreed that the appellate body would change how it operated. More than 25 think tanks and trade groups, including the National Retail Federation and Americans for Prosperity, had also sent a letter Dec. 6 asking that the U.S. agree to the Walker Principles, named after New Zealand's ambassador to the WTO.
Japan’s Diet approved the country’s trade deal with the U.S., Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a Dec. 3 notice, according to an unofficial translation. The deal passed in Japan’s upper house after being approved by Japan’s lower house on Nov. 19 (see 1911190045), and sets up a Jan. 1, 2020, effective date. The deal, signed by the two countries in October, will eliminate nearly 250 tariff lines of Japanese imports into the U.S. and will lower Japanese tariffs on hundreds of U.S. exports, including food and agricultural goods (see 1910070074)
For a second time, a World Trade Organization panel rejected the European Union's claim that it has ended launch subsidies for Airbus, and remedied their adverse effects on Boeing. The earlier compliance panel ruling against Airbus led to the largest authorized tariff action ever at the WTO -- the $7.5 billion worth of goods from EU countries facing either 10 percent or 25 percent tariffs (see 1910020044).
The U.S. and the European Union would recognize each other’s product testing across a variety of sectors including electronics, toys, machinery and measuring instruments, under a proposed agreement released by the EU on Nov. 22. “The EU proposal seeks an agreement, under which the EU and the U.S. would accept the conformity assessment results of each other’s assessment bodies, certifying products against the legal requirement of the other side. This would enable exporters to seek certification of their products in their originating country,” the European Commission said in a press release.
The lower house of the Japan's National Diet approved the country’s trade deal with the U.S., sending the deal to the upper house for approval, according to a Nov. 19 report from The Japan Times. Japan hopes to ratify the deal before the current Diet session ends Dec. 9, the report said. The deal, signed in October (see 1910070074), is expected to take effect Jan. 1.
A World Trade Organization panel has found recalculated U.S. countervailing duties on hot-rolled carbon steel flat products still don’t comply with WTO rules, according to a page on the WTO website. As amended in 2016 (see 1605050061), Commerce’s redetermination was intended to implement a WTO appellate body ruling from 2014. While the WTO sided with the U.S. on several of India’s concerns, it found some of Commerce’s subsidy calculations were still not WTO-compliant, and took issue with the International Trade Commission’s injury determination. In particular, the WTO found that a U.S. law that allows the ITC to combine aspects of its injury determination across several countries violates WTO rules.
The elimination of tariffs is an important condition for the U.S. and China to reach an agreement, said China Commerce Ministry spokesman Gao Feng during a press conference Nov. 14, according to an unofficial translation of a transcript. If a first phase agreement is reached between the two countries, the extent of the tariff cancellation should fully reflect the magnitude of the deal, Gao said. The two sides are discussing this in depth, and China is willing to work together with the U.S. to resolve each other’s core concerns on the basis of equality and mutual respect, he said.