Copyright 1999 Federal News Service, Inc.
Federal News Service
SEPTEMBER 29, 1999, WEDNESDAY
SECTION: IN THE NEWS
LENGTH:
6098 words
HEADLINE: PREPARED TESTIMONY OF
AMBASSADOR CHARLENE BARSHEFSKY
U.S. TRADE REPRESENTATIVE
BEFORE THE
SENATE FINANCE COMMITTEE
SUBJECT - AMERICAN GOALS IN THE
TRADING SYSTEM
BODY:
Mr. Chairman, Senator
Moynihan, Members of the Committee, thank you very much for inviting me to
testify on the U.S. agenda at the World Trade Organization.
The months ahead
are a critical period for both the WTO and the U.S. trade agenda. This November
30th to December 3rd we will host, and I will chair, the World Trade
Organization's Ministerial Conference in Seattle. The Ministerial will be the
largest trade event ever held in the United States, bringing heads of
government, trade ministers, and leaders of business, labor and other
non-governmental associations from around the world to Seattle, and focusing
public attention as never before on the role trade plays in American prosperity.
At this Ministerial, we also expect to launch a new Round of international
trade negotiations, for which President Clinton called in his State of the Union
Address. This initiative has the potential to create significant new
opportunities for American workers, businesses, farmers and ranchers; to ensure
that trade policy does as much as possible to support and complement our efforts
to protect the environment, improve the lives of workers; and to improve the WTO
itself, to make the organization more transparent, responsive, and accessible to
citizens.
We are now working at home and abroad to build the necessary
consensus for an agenda with broad support in the U.S. and worldwide. With the
Ministerial just two months away, the Finance Committee has chosen an ideal time
to review the work; and I look forward to continuing to work closely with the
Committee and other Members of Congress to ensure that the Ministerial and Round
accomplish as much as they should for our country and for the world.
Today I
would like to review for you our stake in the world trading system; the
Ministerial; the results we hope to achieve at Seattle and in the Round; and the
process by which we are building support for the agenda.
U.S. STAKE IN THE
TRADING SYSTEM
The United States is now the world's largest exporter and
importer, carrying on over $2 trillion worth of goods and services trade each
year. Thus, the jobs of millions of American workers, the incomes of farm
families, and the prospects for many of America's businesses depend on open and
stable markets worldwide. Furthermore, a strong trading system helps togive all
participating nations a stake in international stability and prosperity, thus
complementing our work in security policy to keep the peace.
This is the
foundation of the leading role we have taken in the development of the trading
system for over fifty years. Since the creation of the General Agreement on
Tariffs and Trade in 1948, Democratic and Republican Administrations, working in
partnership with Congress, have concluded eight negotiating Rounds. Each
successive Round has opened markets for Americans, and helped to advance basic
principles of rule of law, transparency and fair play in the world economy. Most
recently, since the conclusion of the Uruguay Round in 1994:
- Markets have
opened, as a more open world economy has helped American exports to rise by well
over $200 billion. This has contributed significantly to the rapid economic
growth we have enjoyed over the past five years, and the continuation of the
longest peacetime expansion in America's history. At the same time, it has
helped us to gain high-skill, high-wage jobs, reverse a 20-year period of
decline in wages, and in fact increase wages by 6% in real terms.
- The rule
of law has advanced, as the strong dispute settlement system created by the
Uruguay Round has allowed us to improve enforcement of the trading rules
significantly. Since the creation of the WTO, we have filed more cases than any
other member, and have a very strong record of victories or favorable
settlements in the cases we have filed.
- And we have gained a source of
stability in the world economy. During the financial crisis of the past two
years, with 40% of the world in recession, and six major economies contracting
by 6% or more, we so far have seen no broad reversion to protectionism. This
fact -- in large part a tribute to the respect WTO members have in general shown
for their commitments -- has helped guarantee affected countries the markets
they need to recover, while shielding our own farmers and manufacturing
exporters from still greater potential damage.
THE WORK AHEAD
Despite
these achievements, however, much work remains ahead. The trading system can ,
be made more effective in removing trade barriers, more transparent and
accessible as an institution, and broadened to include nations now outside. With
the Ministerial and Round, we will address issues such as the following:
-
World trade barriers remain high in many areas, including in sectors where the
United States is the world's leader. Agriculture and services are crucially
important examples; in industrial goods, we continue to face significant tariff
and non-tariff trade barriers which a new Round can address.
- Our
leadership in the scientific and technological revolution creates new challenges
andopportunities for the trading system. Electronic commerce and the growth of
the Internet as a medium for trade is an especially important example.
-
Membership in the WTO can make a major contribution to reform in the transition
economies - that is, the nations in Europe and Asia moving away from communist
systems. As successful reformers and WTO members such as Poland, the Czech
Republic and Hungary have observed, WTO membership on
commercially meaningful grounds helps to integrate transition economies into
world trade and make the reforms necessary to create market-based economies,
thus promoting long-term growth and liberalization.
- The results of future
WTO agreements can contribute to the world's efforts to reduce hunger, protect
the environment, improve the lives of workers, promote health and nutrition,
support financial stability, fight bribery and corruption, and promote
transparency and good governance worldwide.
The balance of my testimony
today will review our WTO agenda in four areas: ensuring implementation of the
members' present commitments; developing the agenda for a successful Ministerial
and a new Round; encouraging the accession, on commercially meaningful grounds,
of new members; and the specific steps that can advance the broader vision and
yield immediate results for the U.S. and world economies.
I. COMPLIANCE WITH
AGREEMENTS
First of all, we are working to ensure full compliance with
existing agreements.
The credibility of the trading system, and the
value of any new negotiations, depend on confidence that WTO members will
implement their commitments. We have done so on time and in full, and we expect
our trading partners to do the same.
We have made this point clear to our
partners in Geneva, and 1999 is an especially important year. By January 1,
2000, WTO Members must meet certain Uruguay Round commitments under the
Agreements on Agriculture, Intellectual Property, TRIMs, Subsidies, and Customs
Valuation. In succeeding years, final commitments under the Agreement on
Clothing and Textiles as well as certain aspects of the TRIPS and Subsidies
Agreements will phase in.
Likewise, Uruguay Round tariff commitments will
soon be realized in full.
These commitments represent the balance of
concessions which allowed completion of the Uruguay Round and have helped
realize its benefits since then. The credibility of any future negotiations
depends on their implementation. To ensure implementation, we use all methods
available. This includes use of dispute settlement and U.S. trade laws when
necessary, but also a commitment to the technical assistance programs that allow
some of the developing countries to gain the capacity to meet complex demands in
areas such as services, agriculture and intellectual property.Most recently, we
made a proposal in Geneva stressing the critical importance of implementing
existing WTO agreements, such as those on sanitary and phytosanitary standards,
textiles, technical barriers to trade, anti-dumping and intellectual property
rights. The WTO's built-in agenda provides for extensive and critical review of
agreements, and it is imperative that this work continue as the Round proceeds.
Finally, we are pressing those WTO Members who have agreed to, but not yet
ratified, the Basic Telecommunications and Financial Services Agreements to do
so as soon as possible. This will not only open markets to U.S. providers, but
ensure that all Members can benefit from their commitments and that they can win
the benefits of competition, transparency and technological progress these
Agreements offer.
II. AGENDA FOR THE NEW ROUND
At the same time, we are
working toward international consensus on the specific agenda for the new Round.
1. Developing the Agenda
In general terms, we believe the new Round must
be focused on the top U.S. priorities; have an agenda broad enough to offer
benefits to, and thus win support from, the WTO membership as a
whole, thus creating maximum leverage for achieving our objectives; and yield
concrete results rapidly without raising major new compliance problems.
Our
development of specific objectives to realize these goals has its foundation in
our domestic consultations with Congress, agricultural and business groups,
labor organizations, academics, environmental groups, state and local
government, and others interested in trade policy. This has included Trade
Policy Staff Committee hearings in Atlanta, Dallas, Los Angeles and Chicago, as
well as Washington DC, to gather ideas on priorities and objectives; a series of
Listening Sessions jointly with the Department of Agriculture on the
agricultural agenda, traveling to Indiana, Florida, Minnesota, Tennessee, Texas,
California, Washington, Nebraska, Delaware, Vermont, Iowa and Montana to hear
directly from farmers, ranchers and others interested in agricultural policy;
and continuous consultation with Members of Congress, non-governmental groups,
business associations and others in Washington. At the same time, we have been
meeting with our trading partners to form international consensus on the
negotiating agenda by the Ministerial, at meetings such as the US- Africa
Ministerial, FTAA conferences, the US-EU Summit, the Quad meeting in Tokyo, and
the recent APEC Leaders Meeting in New Zealand, as well as discussions at the
WTO in Geneva.
Based upon these discussions, we believe that in general
terms the Round should set the following goals.
- The core of the Round
should address market access concerns including agriculture,services and
industrial goods (tariff and non- tariff barriers), with benchmarks to ensure
that the negotiations remain on schedule for completion within three years.
- The Round should also pay special attention to areas in which trade policy
can encourage technological progress, notably in electronic commerce.
- This
Round should support and complement efforts to improve worldwide environmental
protection, and ensure that trade policy yields the maximum benefit for the
broadest range of workers.
- And the Round's negotiating agenda should be
complemented and balanced by a forward work-program to address areas in which
consensus does not yet exist for negotiations; and by a series of institutional
reforms to the WTO, with a special focus on transparency and openness.
The
timetable for achieving these goals would be as follows. At Seattle, the
Ministers will take decisions launching the Round, agreeing on the subject
matter, and setting out in specific terms the objectives of the three-year
negotiations. To meet the three-year timetable, the Ministers must give
directions on the manner in which the negotiations would proceed. In practical
terms, the Ministerial must allow negotiations to begin in earnest at the
beginning of 2000, with, as some WTO members suggest, tabling of initial
negotiating proposals by the middle of the year. Further benchmarks to ensure
progress would follow (such as a possible "mid-term" Ministerial review at the
18-month point) with negotiations to conclude by the end of 2002; ratification
in 2003; and implementation to begin immediately afterward.
In the past
months, we have laid out the details of our negotiating agenda at the WTO in
Geneva, by filing formal proposals on agricultural market access,
non-agricultural market access, services, implementation of commitments, trade
and the environment, fishery subsidies, capacity-building, and trade
facilitation. These proposals lay out a clear, specific and manageable agenda
for the Round, as follows:
1. Market Access
Market access negotiations,
as the core of the negotiations, should cover the built-in agenda of agriculture
and services, but also address industrial goods.
In agriculture, aggressive
reform of agricultural trade is at the heart of our agenda. In liberalizing
trade we have the potential to create broader opportunities for American farm
and ranch families, fight hunger and promote nutrition worldwide through
ensuring the broadest possible supplies of food at market prices, ensure that
farmers and ranchers can use the most modem and scientifically proven techniques
without fear of discrimination, and help protect natural resources by reducing
trade-distorting measures which increase pressure on land, water and habitat. To
secure this opportunity, we would set the following objectives:
- Completely
eliminate, and prohibit for the future, all remaining export subsidies as
defined in the Agreement on Agriculture. This is a priority goal we now share
with the Western Hemisphere trade ministers, all APEC members and the Cairns
Group.
- Substantially reduce trade-distorting supports and strengthen rules
that ensure all production-related support is subject to discipline, while
preserving criteria-based "green box" policies that support agriculture while
minimizing distortion to trade;
- Lower tariff rates and bind them,
including but not limited to zero/zero initiatives;
- Improve administration
of tariff-rate quotas; - Strengthen disciplines on the operation of state
trading enterprises;
- Improve market access through a variety of means to
the benefit of least developed Members by all other WTO Members; and
-
Address disciplines to ensure trade in agricultural biotechnology products is
based on transparent, predictable and timely processes.
In services,
American industries are the most competitive in the world, as demonstrated by
our $246 billion in services exports last year. The Uruguay Round created an
important set of rules, but in many cases, actual sector-by-sector
market-opening commitments simply preserved the status quo. Effective market
access and removal of restrictions will allow U.S. providers to export more
efficiently, and help address many broader issues worldwide. Examples include
improving the efficiency of infrastructure sectors including communications,
power and distribution; improving environmental services; easing commerce in
goods through more open distribution systems, thus creating new opportunities
for manufacturers and agricultural producers; and helping to foster financial
stability through competition and transparency in financial sectors. To realize
these opportunities, U.S. objectives would include:
- Liberalize
restrictions in a broad range of services sectors, including the professions,
audiovisual, finance, telecommunications, construction, distribution,
environmental, travel and tourism, and others;
- Ensure that GATS rules
anticipate the development of new technologies, such as the telecommunications
technologies now enabling colleges to teach, hold examinations and grant degrees
via the Internet; home entertainment to be delivered by satellite; and advanced
health care delivered directly to the home or to rural clinics through
telemedicine.;
- Prevent discrimination against particular modes of
delivering services, such as electronic commerce or rights of establishment; and
- Examine "horizontal" methods of improving regulatory policies across the
different industries through general commitments, for example, to transparency
and good-government practices.
In industrial goods, further market-opening
will help Americans promote high-wage, high-skill jobs and create economies of
scale that allow U.S. firms to invest more in research and development and
become more competitive. Here, broad market access negotiations in the nextRound
would build upon the Accelerated Tariff Liberalization initiative calling for
the liberalization of eight specific sectors, and would proceed under the
following principles: - Reduce existing tariff disparities; - Result in fully
bound tariff schedules for all WTO members; - Develop new sectoral agreements
and increase participation in existing sectoral arrangements, including
zero-for-zero and harmonization agreements; - Provide recognition to Members for
bound tariff reductions made as part of recent autonomous liberalization
measures including WTO measures such as the Information Technology Agreement and
Accelerated Tariff Liberalization, and for the general openness of markets. -
Seek interim implementation of results to be considered as an integral part of
the overall balance of market access concessions to be determined at the
conclusion of the new negotiations; - Use of applied rates as the basis for
negotiation, and incorporation of procedures to address non-tariff and other
measures affecting market access; and - Improve market access for least
developed WTO Members by all other Members, through a variety of means.
2.
Additional Overarching Issues
Most delegations, including the U.S., agree
that negotiations should be completed within three years. Given this reality,
and in order to find an appropriate balance of interests and a convergence of
views, certain issues might be appropriate for a forward work program (e.g. on
bribery and corruption) that would help Members, including ourselves, more fully
understand the implications of newer topics and build consensus for the future.
In addition, several overarching issues will inform our work on the core
market access negotiations. These would include:
a. Electronic Commerce One
of the most exciting commercial developments of recent years has been the
adaptation of new information and communications technologies, notably the
Internet, to trade. This has profound implications for reducing the cost of
goods to consumers and improving the efficiency of companies. It can also speed
growth in disadvantaged regions in the U.S. and developing countries, as
Internet access greatly reduces the obstacles entrepreneurs, artisans and small
businesses face in finding customers and managing paperwork.
It is critical
that the WTO act now to ensure that artificial barriers do not delay or block
the benefits of this new method of conducting trade. We have therefore promoted
a broad electronic commerce agenda at the WTO and elsewhere, including a
work-program to ensure technological neutrality in the development of WTO rules,
and capacity-building efforts toensure that developing countries have access to
the Internet. We are encouraged that most WTO members agree that all e-commerce
activities are covered by the traditional WTO disciplines of transparency,
non-discrimination and prevention of unnecessary obstacles to trade. As I will
note later, our top immediate priority is to ensure that cyberspace remains
duty-free - that is, that countries do not apply tariffs to electronic
transmissions.
b. Sustainable Development and Committee on Trade and
Environment
In all these areas, we intend to take special care to ensure
that trade liberalization promotes and supports sustainable development. In
particular, we will pursue trade liberalization in a manner that is fully
consistent with and supportive of this Administration's strong commitment to
protect the environment. The principles we will advance here will include:
-
Considering the environmental implications of the negotiations from start to
finish. President Clinton has committed to conduct an environmental review of
the likely consequences of the Round, and we have called on other countries to
do likewise. In the same vein, we have proposed using the WTO's Trade and
Environment Committee to help identify the environmental implications of
negotiations as they proceed.
- Promoting institutional reforms to ensure
that the public can see the WTO and its processes, notably dispute settlement,
in action; and contribute to its work, including assessment of the environmental
implications of the new Round.
- Pursuing trade liberalization in a way that
is supportive of high environmental standards. This means, among other things,
that the WTO must continue to recognize the right of Members to take measures to
achieve those levels of health, safety and environmental protection that they
deem appropriate -- even when such levels of protection are higher than those
provided by international standards - in a manner consistent with our commitment
to science-based regulation.
- Identifying and pursuing "win-win"
opportunities where opening markets and reducing or eliminating subsidies hold
promise for yielding direct environmental benefits. Examples we have identified
thus far include elimination of tariffs on environmental goods through the
Accelerated Tariff Liberalization initiative; liberalization of trade in
environmental services; elimination of fishery subsidies that contribute to
overfishing; and continued liberalization in the agriculture sector.
-
Strengthening cooperation between the WTO and international organizations
dealing with environmental matters. In this connection, we are pleased that
discussions are going on right now between the WTO and the United Nations
Environment Program on increasing cooperation.We have tabled a number of
proposals in Geneva to advance these objectives, and are carefully examining the
proposals put forward by other countries on trade and environment. In addition,
as we look at other proposals from other countries that are not trade and
environment proposals per se, we will consider how they relate to the
environment and our commitment to high levels of environmental protection. In
all of this work, we welcome the input of this Committee and all stakeholders.
c. Trade and Labor
Likewise, the relationship between trade and labor is an
especially important priority. As President Clinton said to the ILO Conference
in June:
"We must put a human face on the global economy, giving working
people everywhere a stake in its success, equipping them all to reap its
rewards, providing for their families the basic conditions of a just society.
"
Trade policy has a role to play in the realization of this vision.
Development of the trading system must come together with efforts to ensure
respect for internationally recognized core labor standards. And the WTO system
must bring the broadest benefits for the largest possible number of working
people in all nations. Consistent with our statutory requirement under the
Uruguay Round Agreements Act, we are working to build an international consensus
that will enable the WTO to address the relationship between trade and labor
issues.
In the Declaration issued at the WTO's First Ministerial Conference
in Singapore, WTO members renewed their commitment to the observance of core
labor standards. This was the first time Trade Ministers had formally addressed
labor standards. While this was an important first step, we believe that more
attention to the intersection of trade and core labor standards is warranted as
governments and industries wrestle with the complex issues of globalization and
adjustment. We also believe the WTO has an important role to play in the
process. We are continuing to consult with Congress and the labor community in
the U.S., as well as with WTO members who share our interest, on contributions
the WTO can make to the goal.
In January, we submitted a proposal for the
establishment of a work- program in the WTO to address trade issues relating to
labor standards, and areas in which members of the WTO would benefit from
further information and analysis on this relationship and developments in the
International Labor Organization (ILO.) In addition, we will seek to enhance
institutional links between the ILO and the WTO through mutual observer status,
to help facilitate collaboration on issues of concern to both organizations. We
will consult with the Committee on these matters in the months ahead.
Work
at the WTO on these issues is, of course, part of a broader effort centered on
the ILO, which with the President's leadership recently concluded a landmark
Convention on the Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labor. This builds on
a June 1998 Declaration onFundamental Principles and Rights covering core labor
standards as well as a follow-up mechanism. In support of this work, the
President announced in his 1999 State of the Union address a Core Labor
Standards and Social Safety Net Initiative, including a budget request for $25
million for multilateral assistance to be provided through the ILO, to help
countries provide basic labor protections and improve working conditions. We
also, of course, make use of the labor policy tools in our trade statutes,
notably the traditional conditionality under the Generalized System of
Preferences, to promote respect for core labor standards, among others.
3.
Institutional Reform
The past five years of experience with the WTO have
also revealed areas in which the institution can be further strengthened. It can
more fully reflect the basic values of transparency, accessibility and
responsiveness to citizens. And it can do more to ensure that its work and that
of international organizations in related fields are mutually supportive, to
promote as effectively as possible the larger vision of a more prosperous,
sustainable and just world economy.
In response, we have proposed a set of
reforms to make the WTO more effective in its policy responsibilities and at the
same time strengthen the WTO's base of public support. These include:
Institutional Reforms that can strengthen transparency, and build public
support for the WTO by:
- Improving means for stakeholder contacts with
delegations and the WTO; and
- Enhancing transparency in procedures, notably
dispute settlement, and the dissemination of information about WTO issues and
activities to the maximum extent possible.
- Capacity-building, to ensure
that the WTO's less advanced members can implement commitments, and take maximum
advantage of market access opportunities. This plan is based on our close
consultation with our partners in Geneva to ensure that technical assistance and
capacity- building programs meet the actual needs and practical experience of
less developed countries. This is to benefit as well, advantage, as it will help
these countries grow and become better markets for U.S. goods and services.
Specific areas here would include:
- Improve cooperation, coordination and
effectiveness among international organizations in identifying and delivering
technical assistance;
- Build upon and expand the "Integrated Framework"
concept adopted to help least developed countries implement commitments;
-
Ensure the most effective use of resources on technical assistance programs;
- Strengthen capacity-building in regulatory and other infrastructure needs;
and
- Explore a development partner program for the least-developed nations.
Trade Facilitation, which will ensure that U.S. small and medium-sized
businesses as well as less developed economies can take full advantage of the
market-opening commitments created by the Round. Here, objectives would include:
- Clarifying and strengthening the transparency requirements of WTO
Agreements; and
- Helping to improve customs procedures on a global basis,
so as to increase transparency and facilitate more rapid release of goods,
ensuring that our exports reach foreign markets more rapidly and with fewer
encumbrances.
III. TOWARD THE MINISTERIAL
In the months ahead, we will
be working with our trading partners to develop consensus on this agenda
(including issues of timing, and benchmarks to ensure that the negotiations
begin and end promptly), preparing logistically for a successful meeting in
Seattle, and consulting with the Committee and the Congress on all these issues.
We also hope to reach consensus on several initiatives which would help build
the foundation of a successful Round, and take advantage of existing
opportunities to open markets and reform the WTO. They would include the
following:
1. Accessions
The accession of new WTO Members, on
commercially meaningful grounds, is a major endeavor and critical for the
creation of a fair, open and prosperous world economy.
Since 1995, seven new
Members have joined: Bulgaria, Ecuador, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Mongolia, Panama and
Slovenia. Estonia and Georgia have completed their negotiations as well. All of
these represent strong, commercially meaningful agreements. With 31 more
accession applicants, we look forward to further accessions on a similar basis
in the months ahead. Already this year, we have completed bilateral negotiations
with Taiwan and made significant progress on the accessions of Albania, Armenia,
Croatia, Jordan, Lithuania, Moldova and Oman. We have also held important and
fruitful meetings with Russia, Saudi Arabia and Ukraine. Our hope is that
negotiations on a number of these accessions will have been completed by
November.
The largest applicant for accession to the WTO is, of course, the
People's Republic of China. After making significant progress in April, our
negotiations with China were interrupted for over four months by the mistaken
bombing of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade. We resumed informal discussions with
the Chinese early this month, and received direction from Presidents Clinton and
Jiang at the APEC Leaders Meeting in to begin formal talks at the APEC Leaders
meeting in New Zealand.
2. Dispute Settlement ReviewSecond, to promote
American rights and interests, and to ensure the credibility of the WTO as an
institution, a dispute settlement system that helps to secure compliance with
WTO agreements, provides clarity in areas of dispute, and is open to public
observers is of great importance.
Our experience thus far with dispute
settlement has been generally positive: we have used the system more than any
other WTO member, with many successful results. The European Union's failure to
implement panel results in two cases, however, has been very troubling.
While we have retaliated against the EU in both instances, in a WTO-
consistent fashion, we hope to take steps so that in the future, losing parties
must comply or face penalties in a more timely fashion. Likewise, we believe the
system can be more responsive to citizen concerns in a number of ways, notably
through greater public access:
Thus, in the ongoing Dispute Settlement
Review at the WTO, we are seeking to ensure greater transparency and timely
implementation of panel findings. We are particularly interested in providing
for earlier circulation of information on panel reports, making parties'
submissions to panels public, allowing for submission of amicus briefs and
opening the hearings to observers from the public. Our hope is to conclude much
of this work by the Ministerial.
3. Electronic Commerce
As I noted
earlier, we have begun a long-term work program in the WTO to ensure the
unimpeded development of electronic commerce. In the immediate future, our
priority is to avoid the imposition of tariffs on electronic commerce. No WTO
member now considers electronic transmissions as imports subject to customs
duties -- a policy affirmed when we led in securing the May 1998 "standstill" on
e- commerce tariffs. We are working to secure consensus on extending this policy
by the Ministerial, which would help us prevent the future imposition of an
enormous new burden on this growing avenue for trade.
4. Market Access
Fourth, we hope to achieve agreements which expand market access
opportunities in areas of interest to U.S. producers and to our trading partners
in the months ahead. Two , examples could include completion of the Accelerated
Tariff Liberalization begun in APEC (eliminating or harmonizing tariffs in
chemicals; energy equipment; environmental goods; fish and fishery products;
gems and jewelry; medical equipment and scientific instruments; toys; and forest
products) and an Information Technology Agreement II, adding new products to the
areas already covered by the existing ITA.
5. Collaboration with Other
International Organizations
Fifth, we are working toward making the WTO more
able to collaborate with other international institutions, and vice versa, to
support economic stability through mutual observerstatus, joint research
programs when appropriate, better organization of technical resources, mutually
reinforcing programmatic advice and assistance, and other specific initiatives.
Such organizations would include the World Bank, the International Monetary
Fund, the International Labor Organization, the UN Environmental Program, the UN
Development Program, the OECD, LINCTAD, and others.
6. Transparency
Sixth, specific measures to improve transparency, both as an institutional
matter within the WTO, and in governance worldwide. Two priorities include:
- WTO - The WTO should ensure maximum understanding and access to meetings
and procedures, consistent with the government-to-government character of the
institution. As I noted earlier, dispute settlement is a special focus for this
work. Essential goals include such additional measures as more rapid publication
of panel reports, and more rapid de-restriction of documents.
- Transparency
in Government Procurement - The WTO can also help to promote transparency and
good governance worldwide. In this regard, an agreement on transparency in
procurement would create more predictable and competitive bidding, which would
reduce opportunities for bribery and corruption, and help ensure more effective
allocation of resources. The APEC Trade Ministerial and Leaders Meeting both
offered strong support for this goal.
7. Recognizing Stakeholder Interests
Seventh and finally, it is clear as trade grows and the trading system
develops, interest in the WTO will also grow. This is clear from the interest
many American civil society organizations (including businesses, labor
organizations, agricultural producers, women's organizations, environmental
groups, academic associations and others) have shown in the Ministerial and our
plans for the Round. We believe this is a healthy development, and further
believe delegations and WTO staff will benefit from hearing a broad range of
opinions and views on the development of trade policy. We are thus working
toward consensus on methods for such stakeholder organizations to observe
meetings as appropriate, and share views as delegations develop policy.
I am
pleased to report that the WTO will convene a symposium which will allow
dialogue between WTO members and civil society as the Ministerial begins. This
event will be all the more important as it will allow for dialogue between WTO
staff, WTO, senior officials from member countries, and interested citizens as
the activities leading up to the Ministerial conclude and the event begins.
CONCLUSION
In summary, Mr. Chairman, the United States in the months
ahead has a remarkable opportunity. Our predecessors in ten Administrations and
twenty-five Congresses have left us a legacy of bipartisan commitment and
achievement in creating a fair and open world trading system. As a result of
their work, American workers are more productive, American companies more
competitive and American families more prosperous than ever before.
In the
years ahead, we can do the same for the next generation, if we work together to
ensure that the WTO is adapted to address new areas of commerce, persistent
trade barriers, and the concerns of our citizens. As host and Chair of the
Seattle Ministerial Conference, we have a keen responsibility to help create and
bring to completion the agenda that will realize this vision. We look forward to
working in partnership with the Members of this Committee to do so.
Thank
you very much.
END
LOAD-DATE: September 30,
1999