[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 115 (Wednesday, September 8, 1999)]
[Senate]
[Pages S10619-S10621]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
SENATE CONCURENT RESOLUTION 55--ESTABLISHING OBJECTIVES FOR THE NEXT
ROUND OF MULTILATERAL TRADE NEGOTIATIONS
Mr. BAUCUS submitted the following concurrent resolution; which was
referred to the Committee on Finance:
S. Con. Res. 55
Whereas obtaining open, equitable, and reciprocal market
access will benefit both the United States and its trading
partners;
Whereas eliminating or reducing trade barriers and trade
distorting practices will enhance export opportunities for
American industry, agricultural products, and services;
Whereas strengthening international disciplines on
restrictive or trade-distorting import and export practices
will improve the global commercial environment;
Whereas preserving existing rules that prohibit unfair
trade practices is a necessary adjunct to promoting commerce;
Whereas expanding trade will foster economic growth
required for full employment in the United States and the
global economy;
Whereas growth in international trade has immediate and
significant consequences for sound natural resource use and
environmental protection, and for the practice of sustainable
development;
Whereas the World Trade Organization is the single most
important mechanism by which global commerce is regulated;
and
Whereas the United States will host the World Trade
Organization Ministerial Meeting in Seattle in November 1999:
Now, therefore, be it
Resolved by the Senate (the House of Representatives
concurring),
SECTION 1. SENSE OF CONGRESS.
It is the sense of Congress that the executive branch of
the Government should pursue the objectives described in this
concurrent resolution in any negotiations undertaken with
respect to the next round of multilateral trade negotiations
at the World Trade Organization Ministerial Meeting in
Seattle, Washington.
SEC. 2. AGRICULTURE.
The negotiating objectives of the United States with
respect to agriculture should be the following:
(1) To eliminate all current and prohibit all future price
subsidies and export taxes.
(2) To negotiate stronger disciplines on state-owned
trading enterprises, including cross-subsidization, reserved
market share, and price undercutting.
(3) With respect to tariffs, to pursue zero-for-zero or
harmonization agreements for products where current tariff
levels are so disparate that proportional reductions would
yield an unbalanced result.
(4) To target peak tariffs for reduction on a specific
timetable.
(5) To eliminate all tariffs that are less than 5 percent.
(6) To negotiate an agreement that binds all tariffs at
zero wherever possible.
(7) To phase out all tariff rate quotas.
(8) To eliminate all market-distorting domestic subsidies.
(9) To eliminate technology-based discrimination of
agricultural commodities.
(10) To negotiate agriculture and nonagriculture issues as
a single undertaking, with full implementation of any early
agreement contingent on an acceptable final package.
(11) To reach agreements to eliminate unilateral
agricultural sanctions as a tool of foreign policy.
SEC. 3. SERVICES.
The negotiating objectives of the United States with
respect to services should be the following:
(1) To achieve binding commitments on market access and
national treatment.
(2) To achieve broad participation from all World Trade
Organization members in the negotiation of any agreement.
(3) To proceed on a ``negative list'' basis so that all
services will be covered unless specifically listed.
(4) To prevent discrimination based on the mode of
delivery, including electronic delivery.
(5) To negotiate disciplines on transparency and
responsiveness of domestic regulations of services.
SEC. 4. INDUSTRIAL MARKET ACCESS.
The negotiating objectives of the United States with
respect to industrial market access should be the following:
(1) To pursue zero-for-zero or harmonization agreements for
products where current tariff levels are so disparate that
proportional reductions would yield an unbalanced result.
(2) To target peak tariffs for reduction on a specific
timetable.
(3) To eliminate all tariffs that are less than 5 percent.
(4) To negotiate agreements that bind tariffs at zero
wherever possible.
(5) To achieve broad participation in all harmonization
efforts.
(6) To expand the Information Technology Agreement product
coverage and participation.
(7) To make duty-free treatment of electronic transmissions
permanent.
(8) To negotiate short timetables for accelerated tariff
elimination in sectors identified in prior international
trade meetings, particularly in environmental goods.
SEC. 5. OTHER TRADE-RELATED ISSUES.
The negotiating objectives of the United States with
respect to other trade-related issues should be the
following:
(1) To achieve broad participation in Mutual Recognition
Agreements (MRA's) on product standards, conformity
assessment, and certification procedures.
(2) To expand the scope of the Government Procurement
Agreement and make it part of the World Trade Organization
undertaking.
(3) To strengthen protection of intellectual property,
including patents, trademarks, trade secrets, and industrial
layout.
(4) To complete the harmonization of rules of origin.
(5) To strengthen prohibitions against mandatory technology
transfer under the Trade-Related Investment Measures
Agreement.
(6) To broaden agreements on customs-related issues to
facilitate the rapid movement of goods.
(7) To make permanent and binding the moratorium on tariffs
on electronic transmissions.
(8) To establish a consensus that electronic commerce is
neither exclusively a good nor exclusively a service, and
develop rules for transparency, notification, and review of
domestic regulations.
(9) To reach a global agreement on liberal treatment of
digital products in a technologically neutral manner.
(10) To negotiate an agreement for determining when
multilateral environmental agreements are consistent with the
principles of the World Trade Organization.
(11) To undertake early review of potential environmental
impacts of all global agreements with a view toward
mitigating any adverse effects.
(12) To reach agreement that goods and services produced by
forced, prison, or child labor are not protected by
international trade rules.
(13) To establish a mechanism for joint research and
between the World Trade Organization and the International
Labor Organization (ILO).
(14) To institute explicit procedures for inclusion of core
labor standards in the country reports of the World Trade
Organization Trade Policy Review Mechanism.
SEC. 6. WORLD TRADE ORGANIZATION INSTITUTIONAL ISSUES.
The negotiating objectives of the United States with
respect to World Trade Organization institutional issues
should be the following:
(1) To reach agreement not to implement any new trade
restrictive measures during the 3-year negotiating period
beginning with the Seattle Ministerial Meeting.
(2) To broaden membership in the World Trade Organization
by accelerating accessions.
(3) To shorten the timeframes of dispute resolution.
(4) To increase transparency, citizen access, and
responsiveness to submissions from nongovernmental
organizations.
(5) To strengthen disciplines governing the coverage and
implementation of free trade agreements.
(6) To reach an agreement to cooperate with the
International Monetary Fund, the International Bank for
Reconstruction and
[[Page S10620]]
Development, United Nations organizations, and international
economic institutions in trade-related policy matters.
SEC. 7. ISSUES NOT OPEN TO NEGOTIATION.
In all negotiations, the United States Trade Representative
should ensure that the negotiations do not weaken existing
agreements or create opportunities for the imposition of new
barriers in the following areas:
(1) Dumping and antidumping.
(2) Competition policy.
(3) Investment.
(4) Textiles and apparel.
SEC. 8. TRANSMITTAL OF RESOLUTION.
The Secretary of the Senate shall transmit a copy of this
concurrent resolution to the President.
Mr. BAUCUS. Mr. President, I send a concurrent resolution
establishing U.S. goals for the next round of global negotiations in
the World Trade Organization to the desk.
In 1994, seven hard years of talks culminated the Uruguay Round
Agreement creating the WTO. The United States can point with pride to
the results of American leadership on trade. Among the agreement's
notable results were beginning new countries into the rule-based trade
regime; establishing an institution for ongoing trade talks and dispute
resolution; and addressing some key issues for the first time.
The 1994 WTO agreement left unfinished business in two of these key
issues: agriculture and services. WTO members committed to return to
the table in January 2000 to address barriers in these sectors, the so-
called ``built-in agenda.'' It will be a major challenge. Trade-
distorting domestic agricultural programs are politically sensitive,
especially in the European Union, the world's biggest offender in this
area. In services, efforts to open up trade run into difficult
questions of domestic regulation and investment.
Over the past several months, Mr. President, WTO members have
submitted proposals for dealing with agriculture, services, and many
other issues in a new global round of negotiations, to be launched in
Seattle this November when the United States hosts the third WTO
Ministerial Meeting. I have read some of these proposals, including the
proposals submitted by the Administration, and I have compared them two
what I hear from various groups around the country.
I have concluded that the U.S. proposals are timid and lack
specificity. I am very concerned about this. We can't build a strong
global economy without a strong set of trade rules. We can't address
emerging issues such as biotechnology and electronic commerce, areas
where the United States has a commanding lead, unless we supply a
concrete vision of the future. We won't reach our goals unless we can
state our goals clearly. We need a clear set of goals for this round of
trade talks. The American people expect us to show leadership in this
area. Our trading partners expect America to show leadership, too.
We in the Congress have a constitutional responsibility in this
regard. The resolution I am submitting today fulfills our obligation by
giving the Executive Branch specific goals for the upcoming round of
negotiations.
Mr. President, I would like to summarize briefly the main points of
this resolution. It deals not only with agriculture and services, but
also with manufactured products, institutional concerns, and a variety
of other trade-related issues.
agriculture
America's farmers compete very effectively when world markets are not
distorted by government intervention. Eliminating these distortions is
not only good for the farm community, it will benefit U.S. consumers
and our trading partners. It will stimulate demand for agricultural
output, demand which American farmers are prepared to satisfy. My
resolution instructs the Administration to seek elimination of export
subsidies and trade-distorting domestic subsidies, to seek substantial
tariff reductions, and for the first time to impose discipline on State
Trading Enterprises.
Services
Services comprise almost three quarters of American output. We are a
net exporter of services, so increased trade in services will have a
positive effect on our current account balance. My resolution instructs
the Administration to reach a global agreement that trade in services
is free and open unless otherwise specified. The current system is that
trade in services is closed unless otherwise specified. Starting from
this principal of openness, the Administration should seek board
participation in an agreement on services trade.,
Industrial Goods
To establish a negotiating dynamic broad enough to allow for trade-
offs, it is vital that the WTO talks include manufactured products. In
this regard, there has been some confusion as to the U.S. strategy. The
work begun in APEC to cut tarffs in nine sectors has moved into the
WTO. The agriculture community feared that an early agreement to cut
tariffs on manufactured products would rob the overall negotiation of
the required breadth of issues. My resolution makes clear that this
negotiation should be viewed as a single undertaking to be completed in
three years. This does not mean that we can have no results on tariffs
at the Senate WTO Ministerial. But completing accelerated tariff
elimination should be contingent on successfully concluding the entire
package, including agriculture and services.
Institutional Issues
We now have almost five years of experience with the operation of the
Uruguay Round agreement and the WTO. That experience has uncovered some
areas for improvement. Chief among these is the need for greater
transparency in WTO operations. In the state of Montana, we have a
strong tradition of open government which serves us well. The WTO is a
governmental body. The citizens of the nations which compose the WTO
have a right to know what it is doing. We also need to speed up the WTO
system for resolving trade disputes.
Issues Not for Negotiating
There are several issues which the Administration should not include
in the overall negotiation. In some cases, including them would most
likely weaken the results we obtained in the Uruguay Round. In other
case, I do not believe that a global negotiation would benefit the
United States. Issues such as textiles and apparel, antidumping rules,
competition policy, and investment should not be part of the next round
of negotiations.
Other Trade Issues: Environment and Labor
Finally, Mr. President, my resolution lists a number of specific
trade issues which the Administration should address in the next round
of trade negotiations. These include questions such as government
procurement and electronic commerce. Let me mention two particular
matters which are especially important: the environment and labor.
My resolution instructs the Administration to make specific progress
in both of these areas. On the environment, it requires an
environmental assessment of any new global trade agreement, and a WTO
consensus on determining when multilateral environmental agreements are
consistent with international trade rules. It also requires tariff
reductions on environmental products in order to increase the flow of
environmental technology.
As to labor, my resolution requires the Administration to correct a
deficiency which has existed in trade law since the United States
signed the GATT in 1947: it does not allow countries to treat products
made with forced labor or child labor differently. We should all have
the right to prohibit such goods from entering our countries. It also
calls for joint research between the WTO and the International Labor
Organization, and for a regular examination of how WTO members are
living up to their 1996 commitment on core labor standards. Rhetoric is
not a substitute for action.
Goal: Improve Quality of Life
Let me close, Mr. President, with a word about why this is important
to all of us. Since the end of World War Two, we have come a long way
in shaping the world economy. When the GATT was signed in 1947, the
world was engaged in a bitter debate over fundamental values. The
central question was whether national economies should be organized by
market forces and open societies or by central government planners.
Which is better: democracy or communism? The world now knows the answer
to this question with absolutely no ambiguity. Today, anyone who thinks
that central planning wins over market forces need only compare Seoul
to Pyongyang.
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In the past decade, the former Soviet bloc national have struggled to
turn from central planning to market forces and citizen participation.
Developing countries abandoned bankrupt nations like ``import
substitution'' in favor of market-based solutions. OECD countries
deregulated and dismantled trade barriers. New technology, especially
information technology, provided the means to take advantage of newly
opened markets. Goods and capital move with amazing speed.
Open markets make the global economy more efficient. But there's a
distinction between efficiency and equity. Open markets do not make
prosperity more fair. Many citizens believe it is not fair enough. They
see widening income gaps, job insecurity, environmental damage, a less
certain future.
The next round of global trade talks can't make opening markets an
end in itself. We no longer have to convince the world that our
economic system is more efficient. The task now is to show that our
system also improves the quality of their lives. We need to show that
our system delivers benefits to them. It has to make them better off.
If we fail to do that, we will face a world polarized by poverty as it
was once polarized by cold war ideology.
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