USTR Talks Trade With UK, EU, Canada

U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai opened her first full week on the job with a series of video calls with major allies and trading partners -- Canada, the United Kingdom, the European Union -- and diplomatic summaries of the calls from both sides mostly echoed each other, suggesting there was a good deal of agreement.

The first call, to Mary Ng, Canada's trade minister, did show a little daylight, however, as Canada's readout said, “Minister Ng also raised the issue of U.S. tariffs on Canadian softwood lumber and solar products, as well as Buy America provisions,” issues that were not mentioned in the U.S. summary of the March 22 call. There are antidumping and countervailing duties on Canadian softwood lumber. Canada says its solar panels should not be subject to a safeguard tariff, under NAFTA provisions (see 1807230029).

Ng also emphasized that they committed “to strengthening the 2 countries’ deeply integrated supply chains, supporting North American competitiveness.”

The U.S. summary said they agreed to pursue a USMCA Free Trade Commission meeting with Mexico in the near future.

In the call with the European Union's Valdis Dombrovskis, both talked about cooperating on climate change, issues related to large non-market economies and World Trade Organization reform. Both agreed they should work to resolve the civil aircraft subsidies dispute. Tai also said they agreed to work to fight forced labor.

In the call with U.K. Secretary of State for International Trade Liz Truss, they agreed to cooperate on climate change, WTO reform, forced labor and addressing China's unfair trade practices.

The British summary of the call said, “Both welcomed the work to de-escalate the Airbus-Boeing dispute, which paves the way for an even stronger trading relationship. They committed to building on this progress to find a fair and permanent settlement.”

Tai's summary said she's still reviewing the U.S.-U.K. free trade negotiations conducted by the last USTR. Truss's summary said, “They both reflected on the progress made in UK-US Free Trade Agreement negotiations and the importance of continuing to work together to build a closer economic relationship, and agreed to have further discussions.”

After those calls, Tai had a video call with the new WTO director-general, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala. The readout said that the U.S. wants to work “to enhance the global response to COVID-19 and ensure widespread access to vaccines.” Some Democratic House members have been pushing President Joe Biden to agree to ending patents on vaccines and coronavirus treatments to give poor countries faster access to the drugs (see 2102260053).