By Maria Zieba, NPPC assistant vice president of international affairs
President Biden in late May launched the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (IPEF), a trade initiative to forge closer ties with countries in the Asia-Pacific region. While successful talks on important issues related to agriculture, harmonization of standards, supply chains, clean energy and climate change, infrastructure, and taxation and corruption would improve trade in the region, making it easier to get U.S. products into member countries, the IPEF may not significantly increase exports given that market access won’t be discussed.
That’s why the National Pork Producers Council (NPPC) continues to urge the Biden administration to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), which would eliminate tariffs on and non-tariff barriers to U.S. pork exports and create thousands of American jobs. The 11-member CPTPP, which includes Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam, has 500 million consumers and $13.5 trillion of GDP.
There is bipartisan support in Congress for getting in the CPTPP. Several lawmakers, including Sens. Tom Carper (D-Del.) and John Cornyn (R-Texas), the chairman and ranking member, respectively, of the Senate Committee on Finance trade subcommittee, have called on the U.S. to enter the pact.
But because the administration so far has been unenthusiastic about joining the CPTPP, NPPC also is urging it to negotiate bilateral trade deals with countries in Asia, as it did recently with India, the Philippines and Vietnam.
After decades of a de facto ban on it, India in January agreed to unrestricted market access for U.S. pork to its 1.26 billion consumers and growing hotel and restaurant industry. NPPC worked with the U.S. Trade Representative and USDA to get increased market access to the Philippines, which recently extended through the end of the year the country’s lower tariff rates on pork imports. (Last year, it temporarily lowered the tariffs to 15% from 30% for imported pork within the country’s quota and to 25% from 40% for imports above the quota.)
As a result, U.S. pork exports to the Pacific island nation soared in 2021, topping $204 million compared with $114.5 million in 2020, a nearly 79% increase. Now NPPC is working to make the tariff cuts permanent.
Also last year, pressure from the U.S. prompted Vietnam to temporarily reduce its tariff rate to 10 from 15% on imported frozen pork. The reduction took effect July 1.
While bilateral market access agreements have been very beneficial for U.S. pork producers, they take time to negotiate, and that’s the reason NPPC has been so strident in calling for the U.S. to join the CPTPP and for a more robust IPEF.
For U.S. agriculture, which depends heavily on exports, opening new and expanding existing markets in Asia – the fastest-growing region in the world – is critical. Laying the groundwork through the harmonization of sanitary and phytosanitary standards under the IPEF is a great first step, but the U.S. must negotiate deals that provide new market access through the elimination of tariffs and non-tariff barriers to ensure U.S. competitiveness internationally.
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