Monday, January 13, 2014

Meat export group backs trade pacts' fast-tracking - By Richard Knee

An organization boosting beef, pork and lamb exports is supporting legislation that would fast-track presidential authority to forge trans-Pacific and trans-Atlantic free-trade pacts, but the group is not taking a position on the agreements themselves until their details are ironed out and made public.

The Denver-based U.S. Meat Export Federation said in a statement at the weekend that it “strongly supports … presidential Trade Promotion Authority,” but a spokesman stressed on Monday that this did not constitute an endorsement of either the Trans-Pacific Partnership or the Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership.

“USMEF’s position on each of those agreements will depend on the final outcome of negotiations,” communications director Joe Schuele told Cargo Business News. “The statement … simply says that the TPP and TTIP hold great potential for U.S. meat exports. Whether that potential is fulfilled will depend on the degree to which trade barriers are reduced or eliminated.”

The trade pacts are meeting vociferous opposition from labor and environmental advocates who say corporations will be the agreements’ lone beneficiaries. Critics also object to the fact that the negotiations are taking place behind closed doors.

The USMEF’s statement said that for the talks “to fulfill their potential, our trade officials need the strongest possible hand when they are at the negotiating table. Our trading partners need to know that once these agreements are negotiated, they are not going to be changed as they go through the approval process in Congress. The Bipartisan Congressional Trade Priorities Act … will ensure that Congress continues to have a strong voice on trade while giving the administration the support it needs to achieve the best possible outcome for the U.S. red meat industry from the TPP and TTIP negotiations.”


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