Dozens of U.S. and European health and environmental advocacy organizations railed against Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) provisions on chemicals regulation, while rejecting any agreement that includes such language, in a July 10 letter to U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman and European Commissioner on Trade Karel De Gucht. Claiming the pact would allow the U.S. to undermine current regulations in favor of chemical industry interests, the organizations vowed to oppose agreement chapters on regulatory cooperation, investment, technical barriers to trade, sanitary and phytosanitary measures, and all sectoral annexes that relate to chemical regulation.

The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) should continue to insist on comprehensive tariff elimination in the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the immediate elimination of tariffs on as many industrial products as possible, said nearly 20 U.S. industry associations, including the National Association of Manufacturers, in a letter July 11 to USTR chief Michael Froman. The U.S. should not permit “product exclusions or carve outs,” said the letter, while emphasizing Japan, Malaysia and Vietnam are the most critical partners in the agreement for the U.S. because the U.S. does not currently hold trade agreements with those countries. “We urge the immediate elimination of tariffs in TPP partner countries on U.S. manufactured exports, including in particular, automobiles and motor vehicle parts; chemicals; agricultural, construction, electrical, and mining equipment and machinery; leather products; plastics and polymers; remanufactured goods; steel, copper and aluminum products; paper and wood products and distilled spirits,” said the letter. All TPP countries should also join the World Trade Organization Information Technology Agreement as part of their TPP commitments, said the letter. The U.S. is currently pressing China to concede more tariff lines as part of an Information Technology Agreement expansion (see 14070911). Among the TPP participants, Brunei, Chile and Mexico are not party to the agreement (here).

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and its Our Fair Deal coalition (here) partners released two letters to Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) negotiators highlighting how the TPP could strengthen the position of copyright holders, said Jeremy Malcolm, senior global policy analyst, and Maira Sutton, global policy analyst, in an EFF blog post (here) July 9. The letters address TPP's "copyright term extension proposals" (here) and its "intermediary liability proposals" (here), they said. On liability proposals, "countries around the Pacific rim are being pressured to agree to proposed text for the TPP that would require them to adopt a facsimile" of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, said the blog post. "Industry lobbyists are pushing for an even stricter regime, dubbed 'notice and staydown,' that would make it harder than ever before for users and innovators to safely publish creative, transformational content online," it said. Concerning copyright term extensions, the TPP would extend the "rash 20 year extension of the term of copyright protection" to "all other TPP negotiating countries," it said. "This would be a senseless assault on the public domain and on those libraries, authors, educators, users and others who depend upon it," it said.

Obama administration officials have in recent days coerced African countries into withdrawing opposition to implementation of the World Trade Organization (WTO) Trade Facilitation Agreement by leveraging the pending renewal of the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), said Peterson Institute of International Economics Senior Fellow Gary Hufbauer in an interview July 9 at an event sponsored by Peterson and the World Economic Forum. Many African countries over recent weeks have expressed concerns over the availability of financial assistance necessary for implementation of the pact, set to enter into force later this month (see 14070322).

The U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue has yielded progress this week in Information Technology Agreement (ITA) expansion discussions and U.S.-China Bilateral Investment Treaty negotiations, said U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman in a July 10 statement. Froman recently urged China to make preliminary concessions in ITA negotiations in order to restart stalled negotiations prior to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) convention in November (see 14070801). The U.S. and China will intensify ITA discussions over the ensuing weeks, said Froman in the statement. The Chinese government also pledged to move forward with investment treaty negotiations on a “negative list” of sectors of the Chinese economy that the government is prohibiting U.S. investment in, said Froman. Chinese President Xi Jinping called on both sides to implement progress made in the summit in Beijing, while welcoming talks with President Barack Obama during the APEC convention (here).

The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative is asking for eligible candidates to serve as panelists in dispute settlement proceedings under the North American Free Trade Agreement. Applications are due by Aug. 25 and should be submitted electronically via www.regulations.gov, docket number USTR-2014-0013. The positions are three-year terms. Applicants must meet a number of criteria, including objectivity and experience in financial services.

The U.S., along with 12 other nations and the European Union (EU), launched negotiations on the Environmental Goods Agreement at the World Trade Organization (WTO) in Geneva, Switzerland on July 8, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) said. Negotiators will now meet regularly to try to hammer out a deal in a “timely” fashion, said the participants in a joint statement published by USTR. The statement did not give a specific time target for conclusion of negotiations. The other 12 parties to the talks are Australia, Canada, China, Costa Rica, Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, New Zealand, Norway, Singapore, Switzerland and Taiwan.

The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) is urging China to make preliminary concessions toward expanding the Information Technology Agreement (ITA) aimed at restarting stalled negotiations prior to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) convention in November, said USTR chief Michael Froman during a July 7 conference call with reporters. Froman said China is able to concede valuable products for tariff elimination as part of a future ITA expansion deal during the U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue this week in Beijing. “This is an area where concrete progress would have potential positive spillover effects into other negotiations between us, whether it’s the bilateral investment treaty discussions or other international negotiations,” said Froman. “We think it's well within China’s grasp to make progress at the [Dialogue] if they so choose to do so.” U.S. and Chinese officials began negotiations about a year ago.

U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) Michael Froman will travel to Beijing from July 7-11 to participate in the 6th round of the U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue, the Office of the USTR said in its weekly schedule. Assistant USTR and deputy chief of mission to the World Trade Organization (WTO), Christopher Wilson, will participate on July 8 in a WTO press conference in Geneva to mark the launch of Environmental Goods Agreement negotiations. Assistant USTR for Environment and Natural Resources Jennifer Prescott will then on July 8 join a panel discussion in Geneva on green goods duty elimination sponsored by the International Center for Trade and Sustainable Development, USTR said. There are no USTR events scheduled for the remainder of the week, said the release.

The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) reallocated 99,290 metric tons raw value (MTRV) of the U.S. tariff-rate quota (TRQ) for imported raw sugar cane in fiscal year 2014, the agency announced on July 3. Several quota holding countries determined through consultations with USTR they will not be able to meet their TRQ designations, so USTR is providing opportunities for other countries to fill the void based on historical shipments to the U.S., said the agency. The minimum U.S. raw cane sugar TRQ is 1,117,195 MTRV annually, in accordance with World Trade Organization agreement (see 14042835). The reallocation is as follows: