The Obama administration should better address implementation and enforcement issues related to dairy provisions of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), said forty-seven House lawmakers in an April 21 letter (here) to U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman and Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack. The lawmakers call for the administration to ensure Canada doesn’t alter existing U.S. market access lanes, make sure U.S. trading partners follow the spirit of TPP geographical indication (GI) commitments, and to establish procedures to ensure compliance with market access terms the U.S. will provide to the other TPP parties.
Modifying the Harmonized Tariff Schedule, requiring importers to issue more precise product declarations, import tariffs, and undercover investigations could complicate ISIS’ illicit trade of cultural antiquities, which some Iraqi officials estimate to be valued at $100 million overall, participants of an April 19 hearing of the House Financial Services Task Force to Investigate Terror Financing said. ISIS is believed to be smuggling stolen historical artifacts through routes spanning through Lebanon, Greece, and Bulgaria, and a large portion of the goods are thought to enter the U.S., as this country comprises 43 percent of the world’s art market, DePaul University law professor and State Department Cultural Property Advisory Committee member Patty Gerstenblith said during the hearing. That is nearly double the second-place United Kingdom. Terrorism sanctions on bootleggers and dealers would be a logical first step to stemming the flow of the snatched goods, as there is currently no general legal principle governing these illicit transports, Gerstenblith said.
House Agriculture Committee Chairman Michael Conaway, R-Texas, knocked Turkey for its decision to levy a three percent antidumping duty on all U.S. cotton fiber imports into Turkey. The decision was logically baseless, represents “blatant retaliation” against U.S. investigations into Turkish steel exports, “violated WTO procedure, and was anything but transparent,” he said in an April 20 statement (here). The National Cotton Council has said Turkey’s U.S. cotton dumping investigation has no merit. “American cotton growers remain under assault, and the problems just keep coming,” Conaway said. “Just last week, China announced it will start selling off government-owned stockpiles, a result of their reckless policy that has depressed world cotton prices and that continues to hang over the market. Add to that the fact that India’s minimum support price and input subsidies have resulted in India topping China as the world’s largest producer. Now Turkey, the nation’s second largest cotton customer, is slapping U.S. cotton exporters with a three percent duty as retaliation against a U.S. investigation into Turkish steel exports….The findings are baseless and the duties should be dropped immediately."
The House Appropriations Committee’s fiscal 2017 agriculture appropriations bill directs the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service by March 2017 to provide the panel with a report comparing overseas market access allowances for U.S. agriculture products with U.S. market allowances of agriculture imports, according to the committee report of the legislation (here). The APHIS study would also be required to contain information on U.S. export volumes and the quantity and timing of each pending market access request. “Increasingly, U.S. agriculture is facing non-tariff trade barriers, which are limiting the ability for U.S. agriculture to open and maintain access to key export markets,” the committee report says. “The Committee directs APHIS to review and update the list of foreign market access requests submitted by U.S. producers, producer groups, companies and/or non-government agencies.”
The Senate Finance Committee postponed its CBP oversight hearing to hear testimony from CBP Commissioner Gil Kerlikowske, originally scheduled for April 21, the committee said (here). Kerlikowske on April 20 said the hearing may be pushed back so he could attend a border agent's funeral. (see 1604200022).
The American Manufacturing Competitiveness Act of 2016 is set to be voted on by House lawmakers on the House floor under suspension of the rules next week, said House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif. (here). Votes under suspension of the rules allow for speedy approval. “American manufacturers can’t wait any longer to be relieved from the extra tax burden that has been placed on them the past few years—a tax burden that costs our economy $2 billion every year,” McCarthy said in his post. According to an email sent from McCarthy’s office to stakeholders, the House currently plans to consider the bill on April 27, though industry officials have said a suspension vote could happen either April 26 or 27. The House Ways and Means Committee approved the miscellaneous tariff bill (MTB) process legislation on April 20 (see 1604200021).
The full House Ways and Means Committee will mark up miscellaneous tariff bill (MTB) process reform legislation, which would align initial vetting authority for tariff suspension applications with the International Trade Commission, on April 20 at 10 a.m., the committee said (here). The bill would reform the MTB process to uphold House earmark rules (see 1604130047). Republicans had previously the earmark rules as a reason for not renewing the previous MTB procedural framework, which assigned tariff suspension approval authority with Congress and expired on Dec. 31, 2012.
CBP is considering several measures to cut down on lengthy hiring times and personnel attrition, including hardship pay for agricultural specialists, special salary rates for interdiction agents, and arranging a reciprocity agreement with the Defense Department to allow service members to enroll clearance-related tasks they’ve completed—such as polygraph tests—as credits toward Customs application criteria, CBP Office of Resources Management Assistant Commissioner Linda Jacksta said during a House Homeland Security Border and Maritime Security Subcommittee hearing April 19.
The International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) and Pacific Maritime Association (PMA) should continue engagement to prevent port disruptions in the future, even if the two organizations do not renew their labor contract by its July 1, 2019, expiration date, nine House lawmakers said in an April 15 letter to the groups (here). “It is reassuring to know that your organizations appreciate the staggering impact that the 2014-2015 West Coast port disruptions had on shippers, workers, and port users, as well as the regional and national economy, and that you are committed to preventing a repeat of that devastating incident well in advance of the current contract expiration date on July 1, 2019,” said the letter. The lawmakers wrote that recent disruptions hurt entire supply chains and ports that rely on a steady stream of traffic, and said they look forward to working with the ILWU and PMA to boost freight mobility and thwart future disruptions. The letter was signed by Washington Republican Reps. Dave Reichert, Cathy McMorris Rodgers and Dan Newhouse, California Republican Reps. Doug LaMalfa and Devin Nunes, along with Reps. Mike Coffman, R-Colo., Mike Simpson, R-Idaho, and Kurt Schrader, D-Ore., and Del. Amata Radewagen, R-A.S.
Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., on April 14 announced introduction of the China Market Economy Status Congressional Review Act (here), which would give Congress the authority to approve Chinese market economy designations made by the Commerce Department in the context of antidumping cases, according to a press release (here). “Today, across our economy, American businesses are in crisis under the weight of billions of government-subsidized Chinese exports,” DeLauro said in a statement. “Meanwhile, American companies attempting to do business with China have faced severely unfair treatment by the Chinese government. Our trade deficit with China has now increased to a record $366 billion. The China Market Economy Status Congressional Review Act is a critical step in ensuring that we do not sell short our economy with a trading partner that does not play by the rules.” The act would give Congress 45 days to approve or disapprove any China market economy status determination by Commerce. Some, including China, say the U.S. is required to treat China as a market economy in antidumping cases beginning in December 2016 (see 1603020042).