http://www.publicsquare.net/bbpress/ Common Ground, Uncommon Debate en Thu, 09 Sep 2010 13:54:16 +0000 http://www.publicsquare.net/bbpress/topic/should-the-us-congress-pass-the-us-colombia-free-trade-agreement#post-33 Mon, 21 Dec 2009 09:46:07 +0000 Liva 33@http://www.publicsquare.net/bbpress/ <p>The US-Colombia Free Trade Agreement was signed on November 22, 2006. Colombia’s congress approved the agreement in 2007 and it was declared to be in compliance with Colombia’s constitution in July 2008. The FTA is pending US Congress approval. The US Congress can put the treaty on an up or down vote and cannot change the letter of the treaty, since it was signed under US Trade Promotion Authority (through the so-called fast-track provision). </p> <p>The treaty covers similar areas and is structured around the same platform as other US FTAs, covering customs, trade facilitation, Technical Barriers as Trade, government procurement, telecommunications, electronic commerce, intellectual property rights, as well as provisions on labor and environment. The latter two are the main areas of controversies surrounding the treaty.</p> <p>While the proponents of the treaty argue that inaction is costing the US manufacturers millions of dollars in trade, agricultural markets and job creation, the opponents of the treaty claim that US passing the treaty would indirectly support and give legitimacy to the violence in Colombia committed against union workers, lead to environmental degradation, and to loss of control of land to Indigenous and Afro-Colombian communities, among other problems. The proponents of the treaty, in turn, call these assertions outdated and claim that, alongside economic benefits for both parties, a US-Colombia FTA would allow for consolidation of an ally in the region and contribute towards a more secure environment in the region.</p> <p>Question: Should the US Congress pass the US-Colombia FTA, or should it be renegotiated? </p> http://www.publicsquare.net/bbpress/topic/should-the-us-be-more-proactive-regarding-the-asia-pacific-and-apec#post-31 Tue, 01 Dec 2009 11:13:15 +0000 Liva 31@http://www.publicsquare.net/bbpress/ <p>Since the onset of the current financial crisis, there has been a significant drop in the volume of world trade. Marcus Hand, the Asia Editor of Lloyd’s List DCN, claims that the drop has reached a staggering 20 percent. While policy makers encourage the completion of the current WTO Doha Development Trade Round in 2010, evidence of actual prospects of accomplishing the task look grim. Consequently, to prevent the raise of protectionism and its respective side effects and to foster further trade liberalization, regional and bilateral arrangements have been pursued as the next best alternative.<br /> The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) members contribute more than 50 percent of the world GDP. Asia is also the most successful region in recovering from the current global financial crisis. Over the years, APEC has become an increasingly important regional arrangement for the United States—four out of its five largest trading partners are APEC member states and about 60% of US exports are destined for the APEC countries.<br /> In the November 12-14, 2009 APEC Summit in Singapore, the Obama administration identified economic cooperation within APEC as a major foreign economic policy goal. Specifically, the US Trade Representative Ron Kirk, affirmed Obama administration’s definite stance on the issue of free trade and market liberalization and pointed out that US trade with APEC nations currently supports 3.7 million American jobs. Additionally, the US delegation unexpectedly announced that the US would engage in the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a region wide FTA with Asia-Pacific. On the other hand, the Congress is delaying the ratification of a landmark agreement between the US and South Korea and has recently erected trade barriers against selected Chinese imports, while still ignoring demands from Chinese neighbors to take a tougher stance towards the Chinese undervalued currency.<br /> The question, thus arises, whether the US stance demonstrated in the Summit will be sufficient to prevent a further drop in trade volume both for the US and worldwide. Some experts and stake holders claim that the US needs to be more involved in the regional arrangements with Asia and the Pacific, and act like a leader promoting further integration in the APEC framework (the Australian prime minister Rudd, and the Prime Minister of Thailand Abhist among others), as well as act as a stabilizing power in the region. Others (for example Claude Barfield from the AEI) claim that the US might need to step in only after the major APEC economies have agreed on the preferred architecture (e.g., the Japanese proposal for an East Asia Community), as to not cause a backlash against policies that could be seen as intervention, or even intrusion by some APEC governments. As Amitav Acharya from the American University points out, the APEC members welcome US involvement, but not dominance. </p> <p>Question: Can the US economy sustain a further drop in trade volume? Should the Obama administration take a more proactive stance and be more involved in the economic developments in Asia-Pacific and APEC? </p>