Washington DC – The National Foreign Trade Council endorsed proposals announced by the United States Trade Representative to eliminate tariffs and trade barriers as part of it negotiations for the Free Trade Area of the Americas.
“The FTAA would provide a huge boon to the U.S. economy, and help the United States improve ties with Central and South America, and the Caribbean nations,” said Bill Reinsch, President of the National Foreign Trade Council. “We strongly endorse USTR’s proposals to eliminate tariffs as part of this agreement. At the heart of any FTA negotiation is the elimination of tariffs. An FTAA, as well as the range of other FTAs recently completed or under negotiation, are important building blocks towards greater multilateral trade liberalization.”
The NFTC has been on the forefront in calling for the comprehensive elimination of industrial tariffs, alongside calls for reductions in non-tariff barriers, as a central objective of the Doha Round, in a proposal it issued in March 2001. In May 2002, it reissued its tariff proposal, as part of an ambitious ten-point plan for the Doha Development Agenda.
The U.S. FTAA offer envisions the elimination of consumer and industrial tariffs no later than 2015, which is in line with the U.S. “Tariff-Free World 2015” proposal in the WTO.
