US trade official: Ready to draft text for Pacific trade deal
Wall Street Journal | June 23 2010
US trade official: Ready to draft text for Pacific trade deal
By Tom Barkley, Dow Jones Newswires
WASHINGTON (Dow Jones)—The U.S. and seven other countries negotiating a new free-trade bloc in the Asia-Pacific region have made sufficient progress to start drafting the core text of a deal by the next round in October, a U.S. trade official said Wednesday.
The second round of negotiations, held in San Francisco last week, settled the key issue of how the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership would overlap with existing free-trade deals, with the highest standard winning out in any conflicts.
But the more-complicated task of sorting out the various market-opening timelines for manufactured goods and agriculture will require further discussions, the official told reporters on the condition of anonymity. Negotiators plan to meet in August in Peru to try to hash out a deal on market access.
The U.S. would like to preserve the access plans in the existing trade deals, viewing the development of a new schedule as overly complicated, the official said.
The partnership would bring together four countries that already have free-trade deals with the U.S.—Singapore, Chile, Australia and Peru—with New Zealand, Brunei and Vietnam.
Overall, the official described round two as "very successful," with progress made on all fronts.
The pace of talks means any other countries interested in becoming part of the initial bloc would have to be at the table by early next year, the official said. Canada and Malaysia have said they would explore the possibility of joining.
Most important to the Obama administration’s hope of making its first negotiated trade deal a "21st-century" agreement, enough consensus existed on new issues like harmonizing regulations and supply systems to move toward text. The administration plans to consult with Congress and interest groups as it develops proposals on those cross-cutting issues, the official said.
"Because this is the first time we’ve included them in an FTA, we wanted to be kind of open about it and do it in an iterative way," the official said.
In a positive development for wary unions, there was also consensus about exploring additional measures to spur job creation and preserve the environment, including improving cooperation beyond the agreement, the official said.
