Dear International Trade and Investment Committee Members,
Here are the international trade and investment articles and publications of interest for the week of March 3 to March 9. This week’s edition has been curated by Anastasia Semenova. Anastasia is an associate at Gowlings in Ottawa.
Top News
- Canada Prime Minister Stephen Harper said on Sunday he hopes to finalize a free trade agreement with South Korea during a trip there this week. Sources familiar with the negotiations had said last week that the two sides were very close to signing a long-delayed free trade deal after years of talks.
- The US is hoping to finish the 12-country Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) talks by the end of this year, according to a report that was submitted to Congress on Tuesday. This year’s Annual Trade Policy Agenda, which outlines the US executive branch’s priorities for the upcoming year, comes at a time when the Obama trade agenda has come under growing scrutiny from both lawmakers and the US public.
- Over a dozen EU ministers have joined together to call for a rapid agreement on the trading bloc’s 2030 climate and energy goals, either at a leaders’ summit later this month or in June. This week’s meetings marked the first occasion of the new framework being formally discussed at the ministerial level by the 28 member states.
- The EU has reiterated its earlier pledge to ink a trade deal with Kiev, as international tensions over Ukraine’s future escalated further over the weekend following the incursion of Russian military forces into the Crimean peninsula. The fall-out has also put Moscow’s membership in the G-8 into question, while substantially worsening Russia’s economic and political ties with the EU and US.
- EU trade ministers meeting in Athens last week pledged their full support to the ongoing trade talks with the US, as part of a broader push on both sides to allay concerns from public interest groups over the proposed Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (T-TIP). With the fourth round of negotiations set to begin in less than one week, the planned agreement has received amped-up attacks from a diverse collection of critics on both sides of the Atlantic.
- US-India trade ties have continued to worsen in recent weeks, with Indian Trade Minister Anand Sharma accusing Washington this week of “high and unacceptable protectionism.” The remarks from New Delhi’s top trade official comes after months fraught with tension, with the two sides openly sparring on topics ranging from renewable energy policies to patent protections.
Other News of Note
- Prime Minister Stephen Harper departed Sunday for South Korea, where he is widely expected to complete another long round of free-trade negotiations that his critics were denouncing as secretive and potentially bad for Canadian workers. It wasn't known whether Harper planned to sign the final text of a free-trade deal with South Korea -- a laborious, decade-long, on-again, off-again process -- or was simply going to announce an agreement-in-principle in a staged photo-op.
- The United States is finding talks with Japan on opening its agricultural market "extremely tough", a senior U.S. trade official said on Friday, as the two countries prepared for another round of bilateral negotiations. Japanese officials will visit Washington next week in a bid to break a deadlock over tariffs on farm and industrial products, which is drawing out plans to conclude a wider free trade agreement among 12 Pacific Rim nations, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). […] Other countries participating in the TPP talks include Canada, Mexico, Malaysia and Vietnam, and U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman said there had already been important steps forward with some countries.
- Canada's merchandise trade deficit narrowed in January to $177 million from $922 million the previous month, Statistics Canada reported Friday. But the change was due to a decrease in imports, with exports showing only a marginal increase, a sign of a slow start to 2014 for the Canadian economy.
- A fourth round of EU-US trade talks will kick off in Brussels this coming Monday, 10 March 2014. The talks will help pave the way for a future trade and investment deal, known as the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, or TTIP.
- Negotiators will discuss different aspects of the agreement, including: trade in services; public procurement; rules of origin; technical barriers to trade; agriculture; and customs and trade facilitation.
- Stakeholder outreach – Wednesday 12 March
- European Union leaders meet for an emergency summit in Brussels on Thursday to discuss the crisis in Ukraine and how to respond to Russia's seizure of the Crimean peninsula. EU foreign ministers agreed on Monday they would consider "targeted measures" against Russia if it did not reverse course in Ukraine and return its forces to barracks.
- As the US moves to impose sanctions on Russia over Crimea, the EU calls for more negotiations. The European Union and the United States have threatened Russia with punitive measures if Moscow does not reduce tensions in Ukraine. But some European countries are reluctant to impose sanctions due to close trade ties with Russia.
- High Representative (HR) of the EU for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Catherine Ashton and EU Trade Commissioner Karel De Gucht today proposed an integrated EU approach to stop profits from trading minerals being used to fund armed conflicts. The package of measures will make it more difficult for armed groups in conflict-affected and high-risk areas to finance their activities through the mining of and trade in minerals. The focus of the approach is to make it easier for companies to source tin, tantalum, tungsten and gold responsibly and to encourage legitimate trading channels.
Government Announcements/Press Releases
- The Honourable Ed Fast, Minister of International Trade, and Patrick Brown, Member of Parliament for Barrie, today highlighted the manufacturing benefits for Barrie under Canada’s new Global Markets Action Plan and the Canada-EU trade agreement during a regional manufacturing summit.
- The Honourable Ed Fast, Minister of International Trade, and Emmanuel Nganou Djoumessi, Cameroon’s Minister of Economy, Planning and Regional Development, today signed the Canada-Cameroon Foreign Investment Promotion and Protection Agreement (FIPA). The signing took place at the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada (PDAC) International Convention, Trade Show and Investors Exchange in Toronto.
- The Honourable Ed Fast, Minister of International Trade, and Lenny Kivuti, Chairman of Kenya’s Senate Standing Committee on Agriculture, Land and Natural Resources, announce the launch of negotiations toward a foreign investment promotion and protection agreement (FIPA) with Kenya. The announcement was made at the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada’s International Convention, Trade Show and Investors Exchange.
Commentary
- What has become of the Canada-European Union free trade deal? The Harper government announced an “agreement in principle” with the EU in late October. And yet talks continue in a number of areas, notably on a controversial NAFTA-like investment protection chapter that is giving Europeans second thoughts.