The Office of the United States Trade Representative is seeking applicants for the Trade Advisory Committee on Africa for the four-year term that begins in March. Applicants should have knowledge on U.S-Africa trade, including under the African Growth and Opportunity Act; the government is interested in hearing from people with expertise in trade facilitation; sanitary and phyto-sanitary measures and technical barriers to trade; trade capacity building; constraints to trade; investment treaty negotiations; and implementation of World Trade Organization agreements. Applicants can be from industry or services businesses, organized labor, agriculture, non-profit development organizations or academia. Members who are selected will advise USTR on negotiating objectives, the impact of trade agreements, and fulfilling the objectives of AGOA. USTR is seeking to have a diverse committee, not just by demographics, but also by region of the country, the size of the organization the member represents, sectors and points of view.
U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai, after speaking with Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis Jan. 5, said that the U.S. supports Lithuania as it faces economic coercion from China, and that the U.S. wants to work with the European Union "to address coercive diplomatic and economic behavior. They discussed the importance to addressing our shared challenges through a close, transatlantic partnership that embraces and reflects U.S. and EU jointly-held values, which can be supported in part through the U.S.-EU Trade and Technology Council." China stopped allowing Lithuanian goods to enter China after Lithuania publicly supported Taiwan's independence (see 2112090012).
U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai, in a year-end video, pointed to a number of settlements during 2021 that both bolstered America's relationships with its allies and promoted the fight against climate change. She pointed to the settlement of a Section 337 case between two South Korean battery makers that allowed for a Georgia plant to open (see 2104120004); the settlement of the 17-year dispute over subsidies to Airbus and Boeing (see 2106150021 and 2106170025); and the agreement between the European Union and the U.S. to replace Section 232 tariffs with a quota system (see 2111010039).
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative will publish a Federal Registernotice Dec. 27 that describes what proportion of certain tariff rate quotas will be allocated to the United Kingdom since it has left the European Union. The office published changes to the TRQs in July but has discovered some errors in that notice, in chapters four and 24. In addition, it is setting the TRQs for butter, cream and sour cream for 2022 for both the EU and the U.K. The changes, as modified by the correction notice, become effective Jan. 1, 2022.
The Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, which has 11 member countries since the U.S. backed out in 2016, has attracted four applications this year, from the United Kingdom, Taiwan, China and, most recently, South Korea. The U.S., which took a leading role in negotiating the high-standard free trade agreement, is unlikely to ask to come back in the next two years, panelists on a Hudson Institute discussion agreed.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative is seeking comments by Dec. 30 on its proposal to split one of the trade advisory committees into two committees -- one for critical minerals and nonferrous metals, and one for forest products and building materials.The office also intends to establish a committee of chairs of the trade advisory committees to "facilitate cross-sharing of information and provide a powerful tool to gather timely cross-cutting input across sectors." Comments may be made at docket number USTR-2021-2022 on regulations.gov.
A spokesman for the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative said the government "is concerned with Canada’s announcement that it will continue to pursue a unilateral Digital Service Tax." The spokesman said that Canada agreed at the G-20 to pause new digital services taxes until international tax laws change how countries can tax non-residential corporations that provide services. "Canada’s proposed DST would create the possibility of significant retroactive tax liabilities with immediate consequences for U.S. companies. If Canada adopts a DST, USTR would examine all options, including under our trade agreements and domestic statutes.”
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative is seeking written comments on which countries' practices with intellectual property are harmful to U.S. stakeholders. The comments, which can be submitted at regulations.gov, docket number USTR-2021-0021, are due Jan. 31, 2022.
U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai took a victory lap at the U.S Chamber of Commerce's Transatlantic Business Works Summit, pointing to the removal of the digital services taxes on American firms, the agreement on steel and aluminum and the resolution of a 17-year fight on subsidies for Airbus and Boeing.
Maria Pagan, the nominee to lead the U.S. mission at the World Trade Organization, told Senate Finance Committee members that reforming the appellate body is a top priority because "Appellate Body overreaching has shielded China’s non-market practices and hurt the interest of U.S. workers and businesses." She said that appellate body rulings "undermined our ability to protect U.S. workers and businesses from those non-market practices."