Dairy, sugar, rice, tobacco top TPP ag agenda
October 02, 2015 |01:14 PM
As the Trans Pacific Partnership negotiations drag on in Atlanta, dairy, sugar, rice and tobacco top the list of concerns of U.S. farm leaders and lawmakers.
Earlier this week, Senate Finance Committee ranking member Ron Wyden, D-Ore. Issued a statement that “In my view it’s important that the U.S. obtain a balanced dairy package that provides significant new access to Canada’s dairy market, ensure fair limitations and exceptions to copyright provisions, and that the agreement protects the ability of countries to promote public health, including as it relates to regulating tobacco use.”
On Thursday, House Agriculture Committee Chairman Michael Conaway, R-Texas, and 16 of his colleagues sent Trade Representative Michael Froman a letter noting their concerns about dairy, sugar and rice and apparently taking the opposite position of Wyden on tobacco, opposing a carve-out for tobacco.
Inside U.S. Trade reported today from Atlanta that “The U.S. proposal on tobacco would give countries the option to prevent tobacco companies from challenging tobacco control measures under investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS), using a concept that already exists under the U.S. investment model called “denial of benefits.”
Inside U.S. Trade also reported that “a tentative U.S.-Japan agreement on rice market access, which is opposed by the U.S. industry, would provide more than 100,000 metric tons of additional access for U.S. rice to the Japanese market, split between a new country-specific tariff-rate quota (TRQ) and an additional informal allocation of Tokyo’s existing World Trade Organization TRQ.”
Amidst concerns in the dairy industry that U.S. negotiators are not being tough enough, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack told a crop insurance conference in Kansas City on Monday that he had met with dairy producers and told them they had to realize that the United States is negotiating with New Zealand, where dairy is the No. 1 industry and that for the United States dairy “is one of the five or six things” the country is pursuing in the talks.
Ryan Weston, a sugar grower lobbyist, told The Hagstrom Report late Thursday that sugar growers have arrived in Atlanta to be on hand in case USTR needs to consult with them on increased access for Australian sugar. Meanwhile, the Sweetener Users Association has urged negotiators to open up the market.
Earlier this week, Senate Finance Committee ranking member Ron Wyden, D-Ore. Issued a statement that “In my view it’s important that the U.S. obtain a balanced dairy package that provides significant new access to Canada’s dairy market, ensure fair limitations and exceptions to copyright provisions, and that the agreement protects the ability of countries to promote public health, including as it relates to regulating tobacco use.”
On Thursday, House Agriculture Committee Chairman Michael Conaway, R-Texas, and 16 of his colleagues sent Trade Representative Michael Froman a letter noting their concerns about dairy, sugar and rice and apparently taking the opposite position of Wyden on tobacco, opposing a carve-out for tobacco.
Inside U.S. Trade reported today from Atlanta that “The U.S. proposal on tobacco would give countries the option to prevent tobacco companies from challenging tobacco control measures under investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS), using a concept that already exists under the U.S. investment model called “denial of benefits.”
Inside U.S. Trade also reported that “a tentative U.S.-Japan agreement on rice market access, which is opposed by the U.S. industry, would provide more than 100,000 metric tons of additional access for U.S. rice to the Japanese market, split between a new country-specific tariff-rate quota (TRQ) and an additional informal allocation of Tokyo’s existing World Trade Organization TRQ.”
Amidst concerns in the dairy industry that U.S. negotiators are not being tough enough, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack told a crop insurance conference in Kansas City on Monday that he had met with dairy producers and told them they had to realize that the United States is negotiating with New Zealand, where dairy is the No. 1 industry and that for the United States dairy “is one of the five or six things” the country is pursuing in the talks.
Ryan Weston, a sugar grower lobbyist, told The Hagstrom Report late Thursday that sugar growers have arrived in Atlanta to be on hand in case USTR needs to consult with them on increased access for Australian sugar. Meanwhile, the Sweetener Users Association has urged negotiators to open up the market.
