The Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, today welcomed an agreement-in-principle between Canada, the United States, and Mexico on a modernized trade agreement – the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) – that will create good, well‑paying, middle class jobs, strengthen economic ties, and expand Canada’s trade in North America.
Following more than a year of negotiations, the three countries have reached understandings in key areas, including rules of origin for automotive manufacturing, agriculture, labour, intellectual property rights, culture, and dispute settlement.
Further, Canada has ensured that any US Section 232 tariffs will not impact Canadian auto and auto parts exports. Canada has successfully preserved key elements of the original NAFTA, while building on the agreement to expand opportunity and improve protections for workers across North America. The resulting agreement offers crucial predictability and stability for Canadian businesses, investors, traders, workers, and innovators.
Throughout the negotiations, Canada’s approach has been constructive. Negotiating objectives remained clear: defend Canadians’ interests, uphold Canadian values, and fight for Canadian jobs and living standards within an agreement that is mutually beneficial for all three countries.
When this improved agreement is implemented, North American trade will be preserved and modernized for the 21st century – just as we set out to do.
When implemented, the USMCA will help Canadians compete globally and prosper in a healthy, integrated North American economy. The Government of Canada will continue to engage with North American partners to finalize the details of an agreement that benefits all Canadians.
“The agreement-in-principle we reached today is good for Canada, good for Canadian businesses, and most importantly, good for Canadian workers and their families. When this improved agreement is implemented, North American trade will be preserved and modernized for the 21st century – just as we set out to do.”
—The Rt. Hon. Justin Trudeau, Prime Minister of Canada
Quick Facts
• North America is home to more than 486 million people.
• When the North American Free Trade Agreement came into effect on January 1, 1994, it created the largest free trade region in the world at that time, generating economic growth and helping to raise the standard of living for the people of all three member countries.
• The United States and Mexico are, respectively, Canada’s first- and third-largest merchandise trading partners in the world. Canada is respectively the second- and fifth-largest merchandise trading partner of the United States and Mexico, and the largest export market for the United States.
• In 2017, trilateral trade reached nearly USD $1.1 trillion – more than a three-fold increase since 1993.
• To reach this renewed trilateral trade understanding, the Prime Minister, Ministers, Parliamentarians, federal officials, Premiers, and industry representatives directly engaged political and business leaders in the United States to advocate on behalf of Canadians.
• Since January 2016, “Team Canada” visited the United States more than 300 times, and made more than 500 individual contacts with American officials, including the President, the Vice-President, 16 United States Cabinet members, more than 310 members of Congress, and 60 governors and lieutenant governors.
• To help guide negotiations, the Government of Canada consulted with Canadians from across the country and from all sectors and backgrounds about trade. Consultations included meetings with the provinces and territories, industry, unions, civil society, think tanks, academics, Indigenous peoples, women, youth, and the general public.
Don’t miss it. Make a note in your calandar. Register now, before it is too late.
The Brexit decision, deal or ne-deal will be taken at an extra EU Summit in mid-November.
The week after the Summit we in KGH, together with partners, arrange a non-commercial Brexit Symposium in Soest, Germany.
We have a great agenda and high-level speakers. Have a look here: Brexit Symposium
At the Symposium we will explain all about the consequences for trade based on the negotitations and how to be prepared.
Don’t miss this one time event, register now. Limited number of places.
As Beijing and Brussels prepare for meeting next month, EU, US and Japan ‘create coherent point of opposition’ to push it on issues like state subsidies.
China is seeking to work with the European Union on WTO reform, but Beijing will still face a “united front” from the US, EU and Japan on contentious trade issues such as state subsidies, analysts say.
Brussels on Wednesday revealed that EU officials will hold a meeting with their Chinese counterparts on World Trade Organisation reform in Beijing on October 9, after it was first raised by China and the EU this summer.
But the same day, the EU also released a joint statement with the US and Japan making their own remarks on WTO reform, criticising forced technology transfers, industrial subsidies and state-owned enterprises – complaints the three major powers often make against China.
Chinese commerce ministry spokesman Gao Feng responded to the joint statement on Thursday saying Beijing “gives priority to solving problems that threaten the survival of the WTO”, adding that collective problems must be solved through dialogue, and that it does not approve of “individual members imposing their will on others”.
Next month’s meeting is the first for the working group proposed by China and the EU during high-level economic talks in June, partly to address their mutual trade tensions with the United States.
European Commission Vice-President Jyrki Katainen, who met Chinese Vice-Premier Liu He at the talks, said the WTO must be “updated” to prevent unilateral actions like those taken by the US.
Katainen said the EU shared Washington’s concerns regarding Beijing, including industrial subsidies and forced technology transfers, which would be raised during the working group discussions.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini exchanged views on the WTO on the sidelines of the United Nations general assembly meetings in New York on Thursday, with Wang reaffirming China’s position on WTO reform, state media reported without elaborating.
“My impression is that Beijing feels it can survive bilateral trade tariffs but it is truly concerned at the prospect of possible joint measures that would involve the US, EU as well as potentially the Japanese,” said Hervé Lemahieu, research fellow and director of the Asia Power Index Project at the Lowy Institute.
But he said Japan and the EU still disagreed with Trump’s strategy on the WTO, making the degree to which the US could work with partners against China “the key to the new balance of economic power”.
Tu Xinquan, a trade expert at the University of International Business and Economics in Beijing, said “US unilateralism is destroying the WTO and its credibility”, and that China wanted to establish respect for the WTO as a common platform first before discussing details.
“China acknowledges problems like industrial subsidies, but the survival of the organisation should come first,” Tu said.
Kerry Brown, director of the Lau China Institute at King’s College, London, said next month’s meeting was “a strategic move by China to get closer to the EU and try to allay their concerns, but the EU’s relationship with the United States is still very, very strong”.
He added that disputes between China and the EU could limit what the two sides can agree on at the meeting. “China will find it difficult to have a reassuring answer for the EU on the issue of state subsidies – if the whole thing falls down, it will be on this issue,” he said.
Brown also said the goal of the EU, US and Japan putting on a “united front” was to get flexibility from China on issues like subsidies, but that Chinese industry’s heavy dependence on the state will be difficult to change.
“The point of the statement was to create a coherent point of opposition, which is something China will want to avoid” as talks on WTO reform move forward, he said.
Tong Jiadong, a professor of international trade at Nankai University in Tianjin, said China acknowledged the issues listed in the statement, but wanted to address them according to international norms.
“It’s unacceptable that the US has been acting according to its own standards – putting the WTO to one side and instead starting a trade war,” Tong said.
Source: South China Morning Post
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