U.S. Trade Representative (USTR)

A World Trade Organization Appellate Body found in favor of the Obama administration’s challenge to Indian domestic content requirements that developers of solar products in that country use Indian-manufactured cells and modules, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative said (here). The appellate body rejected all of India’s defensive arguments, USTR said. India filed a notice of appeal April 20, after the WTO in February ruled in favor of the U.S. (see 1604220010). U.S. solar exports to India have dropped by more than 90 percent since the 2011 enactment of India’s National Solar Mission, USTR said. “Local content requirements are not only contrary to WTO rules, but actually undermine our efforts to promote clean energy by requiring the use of more expensive and less efficient equipment, making it more difficult for clean energy sources to be cost-competitive,” U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman said in a statement.

The U.S. and 12 other World Trade Organization members are jointly launching plurilateral negotiations in Geneva to ban subsidies for fisheries worldwide, 60 percent of which are being overfished, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative said (here). The members also plan a push for bolstering international standards regarding the reporting and transparency of fishery subsidies, as tens of billions of dollars in these subsidies contribute to overfishing and overcapacity, disadvantaging U.S. fishing industries, among other things, USTR said. Argentina, Australia, Canada, Chile, Colombia, New Zealand, Norway, Papua New Guinea, Peru, Singapore, Switzerland and Uruguay are joining the U.S. in this effort. "The United States has been a leader on this issue,” U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman said in a statement. “We are eager to join with similarly committed WTO Members to negotiate new rules that will help protect the marine environment and allow American fishermen and women to compete on a fair and level playing field." U.S. fishing industries in 2014 exported an estimated $5.8 billion in edible fish products around the world, USTR said.

Fewer House lawmakers back the Trans-Pacific Partnership than supported Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) legislation last year, and congressional TPP approval will require “a lot of political work,” House Ways and Means Trade Subcommittee Chairman Dave Reichert, R-Wash., told members of the President’s Export Council Sept. 14 (here). Still, progress is being made toward a resolution of lawmakers’ concerns over the pact’s biologics provisions, he said. “There are some political realities here that we all know are creating this uphill battle for us,” Reichert said. “The reality is we’ve lost some votes with some of the issues -- tobacco being one of those. Those people who voted for TPA are no longer on board with TPP.”

U.S. negotiators and the government of Morocco agreed in principle to modify rules of origin for textile and apparel goods under tariff provisions of the U.S.-Morocco Free Trade Agreement to reflect initial determinations that U.S. and Moroccan producers can’t produce certain fabrics in large bulk quantities in a timely manner, U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman said in a letter to International Trade Commission Chairman Irving Williamson (here). With final approval, products listed in the agreement as originating would include:

The U.S. and the UK could negotiate a new free trade agreement in the span of a year after the UK's exit from the EU, former U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab said during a conference call held by Mayer Brown. But she cautioned that the “Brexit” might not be complete until 2021, three years longer than EU and UK officials have said they expect it to take. Certain things could bode well for prospects of a bilateral U.S.-UK trade deal or for UK trade deals with other nations, including the opportunity to reduce its external tariff to a rate lower than the EU common tariff and the UK’s lack of a major agriculture industry, which tends to snag most trade agreements, Schwab said. Singapore, Chile, New Zealand, Australia and the Pacific Alliance bloc, which consists of Peru, Mexico and Colombia alongside Chile, all have liberal free trade policies and could hook up with the UK through trade agreements, she said.

The U.S. amended a request for World Trade Organization consultations it filed last week, adding chromium to its list of raw materials subject to contested Chinese export duties and a new section on Chinese export quotas for antimony, indium, magnesia, talc and tin, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative said in a statement. Vital U.S. sectors use those elements to make aerospace, automotive, construction and electronics products, it said. China’s duties and quotas advantage Chinese industries at the expense of U.S. companies, USTR said. “The restraints we challenged last week, along with the ones we have included today, are part and parcel of the same troubling policy – one that provides advantages for China in important manufacturing sectors at the expense of the rest of the world,” U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman said in a statement.

A group of 25 senators led by Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, urged the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative to conclude a new U.S.-Canada Softwood Lumber Agreement (SLA) that will limit Canadian lumber exports to an agreed-upon U.S. market share, adding that Canadian imports “are capturing an ever larger market share,” which seriously imperils U.S. mills, workers and communities. In a letter to U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman (here), the senators said only a long-term agreement would materialize into anything impactful. “The now-expired 2006 trade agreement became an ineffective framework for managing subsidized Canadian lumber trade as market realities changed since that agreement was put in place,” the letter says. “A truly durable solution cannot be based on an outmoded framework that does not offset the harmful effects of subsidized Canadian lumber in impaired or unfairly traded imports.”

The U.S. is requesting World Trade Organization consultations over Chinese export duties on 21 tariff lines related to the raw materials antimony, cobalt, copper, graphite, lead, magnesia, talc, tantalum and tin, for which Beijing charges 5 percent to 20 percent ad valorem rates, U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman announced (here). The duties hurt U.S. chemical, steel and automotive sectors, to name a few, make the materials more expensive for downstream U.S. manufacturers, and encourage U.S. and other non-Chinese producers to move production to China, Froman’s office said. China committed to erase export duties for all products except those listed in a specific annex upon its accession to the WTO, USTR said. Vice President Joe Biden is addressing the issue during a speech at the Port of San Diego July 13.

Office of the U.S. Trade Representative Deputy Permanent Representative to the World Trade Organization Christopher Wilson commended Zambia for its reform efforts and its 6.6 percent rate of economic growth since 2009, but urged the country to better utilize its benefits under the African Growth and Opportunity Act during WTO’s Trade Policy Review of Zambia, USTR said (here).

The U.S. and Uruguay on May 11 convened the seventh meeting of the bilateral Trade and Investment Council in Montevideo under the U.S.-Uruguay Trade and Investment Framework Agreement, as Assistant U.S. Trade Representative John Melle met with Uruguayan Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Jose Luis Cancela Gomez, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative said in a press release. Melle and Gomez discussed issues including trade facilitation, improving opportunities for small and medium enterprises, the digital economy, and market access, USTR said. The next meeting will be held in Washington next year.