International Trade Today is providing readers with some of the top stories for Nov. 13-16 in case they were missed.
Tariffs on steel and aluminum from Canada and the U.S. are "entirely inconsistent with the overall goals" of the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement, a group of more than 35 trade groups told the U.S. trade representative in a letter sent Nov 19., and should be lifted so that the new NAFTA deal can be ratified. The letter, led by the National Foreign Trade Council, said that Congress may have a more difficult time ratifying the trade deal, given how many members have complained that tariffs are not needed on our neighbors. And, while the letter does not request a global lifting of the steel and aluminum tariffs, it says that the quotas and tariffs "have caused significant harm" to American manufacturers, and that the increased costs endanger jobs across many sectors, far more than those in the mills and smelters protected by the tariffs.
Congress has been fairly passive on tariffs so far, Sen. Doug Jones acknowledged at a field hearing in his home state of Alabama, but, the Democrat said, "hopefully, as we go into a new Congress we will see some more activity." Jones, who heard from farmers, steel consumers, the Port of Mobile, auto manufacturers and steel mills during his hearing Nov. 19, said he believes that several administrations "have been fast and loose with this national security measure," referring to Section 232. The measure was used as the basis to hike tariffs on steel and aluminum, and could be used for similar actions on imported uranium, auto parts and autos. Jones noted the bill led by Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio -- Jones is a co-sponsor (see 1808010048) -- that would give Congress the opportunity to veto future Section 232 tariffs.
The U.S. International Trade Commission, hosting lobbyists on the new NAFTA for a second day Nov. 16, tried to sort out whose perspective was most germane on the trade pact's impact, as producers and customers, manufacturers and importers and even producers and producers disagreed about the policy impact of what the U.S. trade representative did -- or didn't do -- in the negotiations.
Determining how the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement will change the economics of auto and auto parts manufacturing in America is critical for the U.S. International Trade Commission, which is responsible for estimating the economic effects of the pact. Of all the exports from the U.S. to its NAFTA partners -- $419 billion in 2015 -- $67 billion is automotive, according to the Center for Automotive Research. In the most recent data, the U.S. imported more than $58 billion in new vehicles from Mexico and Canada through the first eight months of 2018, and exported more than $18 billion new vehicles to those countries, according to the International Trade Administration.
The changes to the Section 232 aluminum exclusion process described in an interim final rule from the Commerce Department have not yet improved the process, The Aluminum Association said in its comments submitted Nov. 13 on that interim final rule. Decisions have only been made on about 20 percent of the published exclusion requests, and there are still requests published six months ago that haven't gotten an answer. "While the number of requests, objections, rebuttals and sur-rebuttals in the aluminum docket are far lower than the steel docket, the requests -- as well as objections and rebuttals -- are still difficult to monitor" because there's no adequate tracking system. Users can't search on HTS code, country of origin or the type of alloys -- they have to open every single file, the trade group noted.
Americans and Canadians are talking about ending U.S. tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum and the Canadian countermeasures that followed, but Canadian Deputy Ambassador to the U.S. Kirsten Hillman said much remains uncertain. "Whether or not that will come to a successful conclusion before the signing is something I cannot predict," said Hillman, a veteran trade negotiator sent to Washington specifically for the NAFTA renegotiation. She couldn't say how the resolution would come about, and if some kind of cap on Canadian exports of those metals would be part of it.
Chern-Chyi Chen, deputy representative for trade and economic affairs for Taiwan in Washington, said "witnessing a trade paradigm shift" has been very interesting. Taiwan, the 11th-largest trading partner with the U.S., is accelerating its investment outside of China as the U.S.-China trade conflict builds, according to Rupert Hammond-Chambers, the president of the U.S.-Taiwan Business Council. The two were guests at a Heritage Foundation event on U.S. trade with Taiwan on Nov. 13. The event was timed to a new report on Taiwan from Heritage researcher Riley Walters.
Investors were worried about the fate of NAFTA and the U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement when they were "works in progress," Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said Nov. 13. "And I think people in general think they turned out very, very well." So, Ross told an interviewer at Yahoo Finance's All Markets Summit, investors shouldn't lose confidence in the president's trade policy with China "because they're afraid of the unknown." He noted that Chinese negotiators are probably visiting Washington ahead of the G-20 summit, when the U.S. and Chinese presidents will talk about trade. But he cautioned that the problems with China are structural, and so won't easily be solved.
CBP issued a Nov. 13 CSMS message with "guidance for the entry filing of imports of steel mill articles and aluminum products granted relief, under section 232." CBP said "ACE is programmed to process imports granted relief from quantitative limits" and listed HTS subheadings for imported goods subject to an exclusion. "Failure to follow these instructions may result in the quota exemption not processing and the entry being rejected," CBP said.