Mexico today added pork to the list of U.S. products against which it is retaliating for the failure of the United States to live up to its obligations under the North American Free Trade Agreement to let Mexican trucks haul goods into the United States.
Negative impact
“Mexico’s retaliation against U.S. pork will have negative economic consequences for America’s pork producers,” said NPPC President Sam Carney, a producer from Adair, Iowa. “We are extremely disappointed that our top volume export market has taken this action, but we’re more disappointed that the United States is not living up to its trade obligations.
“That failure not only has hurt dozens of U.S. industries economically, but it could prompt other countries to think twice about entering into trade deals with the United States,” Carney added. “Our trading partners need assurance that the United States will live up to its trade obligations.”
US Congress failed to renew program allowing Mexican goods in
The U.S. Congress in early March 2009 failed to renew a pilot program that allowed a limited number of Mexican trucks to haul freight into United States beyond a 25-mile commercial zone. The Cross-Border Trucking Pilot Program was started by the U.S.
Department of Transportation in September 2007 as a way to begin implementing the NAFTA trucking provision, which was supposed to take effect in December 1995.
In February 2001, a NAFTA dispute-settlement panel ruled that excluding Mexican trucks violated U.S. obligations under the trade deal. The ruling gave Mexico the right to retaliate against U.S. products, which it did in March 2009, placing higher tariffs
on more than $2.4 billion of U.S. goods. Pork was not included on that initial retaliation list.
“Mexico is a top market for all kinds of U.S. exports, providing millions of jobs to U.S. workers,” said Carney. “The retaliation puts thousands of agricultural jobs at risk, including, now, pork industry jobs, and thousands of manufacturing jobs at risk.”
NPPC has been urging the Obama administration to work with Congress to quickly resolve the trucking issue with Mexico, which last year bought $762 million of U.S. pork.
Source: NPPC
