Senate Finance Releases Witness List for Hearing on Counterfeits and Small Business Exporters
The Senate Finance Committee released a list of witnesses for its June 15 hearing on counterfeits and opportunities for small business exporters in the digital age (here). Testifying will be ICE U.S. National Intellectual Property Rights Coordination Center Director Bruce Foucart, UPS Vice President of Global Customs Policy & Public Affairs Norman Schenk, and Belkin International General Counsel Tom Triggs. The hearing will likely focus on the importance of protecting U.S. intellectual property as e-commerce poses new challenges for traders, said Sandler Travis Senior Director for International Trade and Governmental Relations Edward Steiner.
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Committee members are expected to discuss how well recent trade agreements, including the Trans-Pacific Partnership, would address small business challenges, Steiner said. “There has been a discussion, let’s say, about small businesses benefiting from trade agreements,” he said. “Big multinational companies have been the ones involved in trade historically; and consequently, the way trade agreements have been designed is for large-scale trade, large-scale repetitive trade in goods, large volume, and for large companies who have resources.” Steiner stressed that multinational companies’ dominance of the global trade landscape is “not nefarious,” but rather naturally follows from traditional trade agreement models. He said the hearing will attempt to reconcile how well small businesses have fared in recent trade agreements and will examine potential paths forward. “With the advent of e-commerce, you have this whole new type of exporter and type of export that are real potential engines for growth,” Steiner said.