Agricultural News
US China Phase One Deal Signed- Agricultural Details and Full Text Now Available
Wed, 15 Jan 2020 13:11:21 CST
President Donald Trump and Chinese Vice Premier Liu have signed the US China Phase One Trade Deal at the White House on Wednesday- and the US Trade Representative's office has now released details of the deal.
The Phase One trade deal requires structural reforms and other changes to China's economic and trade regime in the areas of intellectual property, technology transfer, agriculture, financial services, and currency and foreign exchange. The Phase One agreement also includes a commitment by China that it will make substantial additional purchases of U.S. goods and services in the coming years. Importantly, the agreement establishes a strong dispute resolution system that ensures prompt and effective implementation and enforcement. The United States has agreed to modify its Section 301 tariff actions in a significant way.
Here are the highlights of the Ag Provisions of the agreement:
Since 2009, China has been one of the top four largest export markets in the world for U.S. food, agricultural, and seafood products. China's rapidlydeveloping economy has become one of the fastest growing markets in the world. While China represents a major market for U.S. agricultural exports, China's overly restrictive and burdensome import requirements have hampered the ability of U.S. farmers to compete on a level playing field.
The Phase One economic and trade agreement signed by the United States and China on January 15, 2020, will further open China's food and agriculture market to American products. The Phase One agreement addresses structural barriers to trade and will support a dramatic expansion of U.S. food, agriculture, and seafood product exports, increase American farm and fishery income, generate more rural economic activity, and promote job growth.
Key outcomes of the Phase One agreement are:
· Purchases: China will purchase and import on average at least $40 billion of U.S. food, agricultural, and seafood products annually for a total of at least $80 billion over the next two years. Products will cover the full range of U.S. food, agricultural, and seafood products. On top of that, China will strive to import an additional $5 billion per year over the next two years.
· Agricultural Biotechnology: China has agreed to implement a transparent, predictable, efficient, science- and risk-based regulatory process for the evaluation and authorization of products of agricultural biotechnology. China's time frame for review and authorization for 2 products for feed or further processing will be an average of 24 months. China has also agreed to certain administrative improvements in the application process, and to certain steps to address situations of lowlevel presence.
· Domestic Support: China has agreed to abide by its current World Trade Organization (WTO) obligations on the transparency of its domestic support measures. Separate from this Agreement, as part of a WTO dispute brought and won by the United States, China previously agreed to comply with its WTO obligations on its domestic support for rice and wheat by March 31, 2020. The United States maintains the right to take actions related to that dispute.
· Tariff Rate Quota Administration: China has agreed to comply with its WTO obligations and to make specific improvements to its administration of wheat, corn, and rice tariff-rate quotas (TRQs), including the allocation methodology, treatment of non-state trading quota applicants, and transparency. Separate from this Agreement, as part of a WTO dispute brought and won by the United States, China agreed to comply with its WTO obligations for the administration of TRQs for wheat, corn, and rice by December 31, 2019.
· Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures: The Phase One agreement streamlines and establishes timeframes for Chinese regulatory actions for meat, poultry, seafood, dairy, infant formula, rice, potatoes, nectarines, blueberries, avocadoes, barley, alfalfa pellets, hay, feed additives, distillers' dried grains (DDGs), distillers' dried grains with solubles (DDGS), and pet food. The Parties agreed to not implement food safety regulations that are not science- and risk-based and shall only apply such regulations to the extent necessary to protect human life or health. In addition, recognizing the importance of ensuring that sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) measures are science-based, nondiscriminatory, and account for regional differences, the Parties have agreed that China will improve SPS measures affecting a wide variety of products, which will facilitate exports of U.S. food and agricultural products to China.
· Geographical Indications (GIs): China has agreed to not undermine market access for U.S. exports to China using trademarks and generic terms through any GI measures taken in connection with an international agreement, to use certain relevant factors when making determinations for genericness, and to not provide GI protection to 3 individual components of multi-component terms if the individual component is generic.
· Intellectual Property for Agriculture: China has agreed to prohibit the unauthorized disclosure of undisclosed information, trade secrets, or confidential business information by government personnel or third party experts or advisors when such information is submitted to the central or sub-central levels of government.
To read the complete fact sheet on agriculture, click or tap here.
Click here for the USTR's webpage with links to all of the Fact Sheet for the Phase One Agreement.
And- here is the complete 96 page Agreement (English version) as signed today at the White House- Click or tap here.
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