The U.S. said that it has received no details on changes to subsidized loans for Airbus from France and Spain, so “no one can take seriously” that the changes addressed the entirety of the World Trade Organization decision that the subsidies distorted the market. The U.S. made the comments at a Dispute Settlement Committee in Geneva July 29, a Geneva trade official said. The U.S. representative also said the European Union didn't address the other six measures the WTO identified as distorting. The EU had said last week that the changes resolved the case, so the 15% tariffs on Airbus planes and 25% tariffs on other EU exports should be removed immediately (see 2007240057).
Experts disagreed on the utility of the Trump administration approach to World Trade Organization reform, during a Senate Finance Committee hearing on the topic, and senators on the left and right suggested that the negotiated trade rules disadvantage Americans.
Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden told the United Steelworkers trade union that a core part of his trade strategy “will be to enlist our international allies to collectively tackle unfair practices by China in order to ensure American steelworkers have good, plentiful union jobs. Trump has humiliated and infuriated our allies.”
Spain and France announced that Airbus is going to repay subsidy launch loans at market rates -- Germany and the United Kingdom have already been paid back -- and the European Commission said July 24 that this “removes any grounds for the U.S. to maintain its countermeasures on EU exports and makes a strong case for a rapid settlement of the long-running dispute.” The World Trade Organization ruled last year that Airbus and the four countries were not in compliance with industrial subsidy disciplines, and the U.S. imposed 10% tariffs on Airbus planes and 25% tariffs on various foods and beverages, and some apparel and tools (see 1910020044).
The Customs chapter in the U.S. Code, Title 19, will be reorganized by subject matter, not chronologically, the Office of Law Revision Counsel recently announced. Title 19 appeared in 1926, and has 30 chapters. “The new Title 19 -- renamed as Customs and International Trade -- will enable general and permanent laws related to customs and international trade to be better organized and maintained," the Office of Law Revision Counsel said on its website. "Using an act-centric organization framework, the structure of the new title reflects the structure of included acts where possible.”
The U.S. and the European Union should be able to “come to a convergence” on seven planks of reform of the appellate body at the World Trade Organization, said Ignacio Garcia Bercero, European Union Visiting Fellow, Oxford University and a chief negotiator at the European Commission. Garcia Bercero, who noted he was not speaking on behalf of the European Commission, was a panelist on a WTO Reform webinar hosted by the Washington International Trade Association July 23.
Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, a long-time development economist and former finance and foreign minister in Nigeria, said that bringing back the appellate function at the World Trade Organization would be a top priority if she were chosen as the next director-general of the WTO. “You cannot have a rules-making organization where you do not have a forum where you can arbitrate disputes,” she told the Washington International Trade Association during a webinar July 21.
It's not enough to just restrict sales of chips to Huawei, and convince allies not to use the Chinese company in their 5G networks, experts said at a Senate Banking Committee Economic Policy Subcommittee hearing on July 22. Rather, they testified, both 5G and export controls should be looked at more broadly. Martijn Rasser, senior fellow in the Center for a New American Security's Technology and National Security Program, said that 5G networks will be essential to all that the U.S. does in technology, so getting 5G right is urgent.
Michael Nemelka, the nominee for deputy U.S. trade representative, said that the first case under USMCA could begin in the fall, if consultations with Canada or Mexico fail. Nemelka, who currently works as a special adviser to the USTR, said that they are reviewing complaints this month. After that, staff will consult with the congressional committees of jurisdiction about which complaints would make the best cases. Then a consultation process would begin.
House Ways and Means Committee ranking member Kevin Brady, R-Texas, one of the four players directing the shape of a USMCA technical corrections bill, said that the “language was a little different than the intent” when it came to the treatment of foreign-trade zones in USMCA's implementing bill. Brady and the leaders of the Ways and Means and Senate Finance committees see getting a technical corrections bill passed as “a high priority,” he said in a recent interview.