§ 2901. Overall and principal trade negotiating objectives of the United States

§ 2901. Overall and principal trade negotiating objectives of the United States

(a) Overall trade negotiating objectives The overall trade negotiating objectives of the United States are to obtain—

(1) more open, equitable, and reciprocal market access;

(2) the reduction or elimination of barriers and other trade-distorting policies and practices; and

(3) a more effective system of international trading disciplines and procedures.

(b) Principal trade negotiating objectives

(1) Dispute settlement The principal negotiating objectives of the United States with respect to dispute settlement are—

(A) to provide for more effective and expeditious dispute settlement mechanisms and procedures; and

(B) to ensure that such mechanisms within the GATT and GATT agreements provide for more effective and expeditious resolution of disputes and enable better enforcement of United States rights.

(2) Improvement of the GATT and multilateral trade negotiation agreements The principal negotiating objectives of the United States regarding the improvement of GATT and multilateral trade negotiation agreements are—

(A) to enhance the status of the GATT;

(B) to improve the operation and extend the coverage of the GATT and such agreements and arrangements to products, sectors, and conditions of trade not adequately covered; and

(C) to expand country participation in particular agreements or arrangements, where appropriate.

(3) Transparency The principal negotiating objective of the United States regarding transparency is to obtain broader application of the principle of transparency and clarification of the costs and benefits of trade policy actions through the observance of open and equitable procedures in trade matters by Contracting Parties to the GATT.

(4) Developing countries The principal negotiating objectives of the United States regarding developing countries are—

(A) to ensure that developing countries promote economic development by assuming the fullest possible measure of responsibility for achieving and maintaining an open international trading system by providing reciprocal benefits and assuming equivalent obligations with respect to their import and export practices; and

(B) to establish procedures for reducing nonreciprocal trade benefits for the more advanced developing countries.

(5) Current account surpluses The principal negotiating objective of the United States regarding current account surpluses is to develop rules to address large and persistent global current account imbalances of countries, including imbalances which threaten the stability of the international trading system, by imposing greater responsibility on such countries to undertake policy changes aimed at restoring current account equilibrium, including expedited implementation of trade agreements where feasible and appropriate.

(6) Trade and monetary coordination The principal negotiating objective of the United States regarding trade and monetary coordination is to develop mechanisms to assure greater coordination, consistency, and cooperation between international trade and monetary systems and institutions.

(7) Agriculture The principal negotiating objectives of the United States with respect to agriculture are to achieve, on an expedited basis to the maximum extent feasible, more open and fair conditions of trade in agricultural commodities by—

(A) developing, strengthening, and clarifying rules for agricultural trade, including disciplines on restrictive or trade-distorting import and export practices;

(B) increasing United States agricultural exports by eliminating barriers to trade (including transparent and nontransparent barriers) and reducing or eliminating the subsidization of agricultural production consistent with the United States policy of agricultural stabilization in cyclical and unpredictable markets;

(C) creating a free and more open world agricultural trading system by resolving questions pertaining to export and other trade-distorting subsidies, market pricing and market access and eliminating and reducing substantially other specific constraints to fair trade and more open market access, such as tariffs, quotas, and other nontariff practices, including unjustified phytosanitary and sanitary restrictions; and

(D) seeking agreements by which the major agricultural exporting nations agree to pursue policies to reduce excessive production of agricultural commodities during periods of oversupply, with due regard for the fact that the United States already undertakes such policies, and without recourse to arbitrary schemes to divide market shares among major exporting countries.

(8) Unfair trade practices The principal negotiating objectives of the United States with respect to unfair trade practices are—

(A) to improve the provisions of the GATT and nontariff measure agreements in order to define, deter, discourage the persistent use of, and otherwise discipline unfair trade practices having adverse trade effects, including forms of subsidy and dumping and other practices not adequately covered such as resource input subsidies, diversionary dumping, dumped or subsidized inputs, and export targeting practices;

(B) to obtain the application of similar rules to the treatment of primary and nonprimary products in the Agreement on Interpretation and Application of Articles VI, XVI, and XXIII of the GATT (relating to subsidies and countervailing measures); and

(C) to obtain the enforcement of GATT rules against—

as a condition for the importation of any product or service of the United States into the foreign country or as a condition for carrying on business in the foreign country.

(i) state trading enterprises, and

(ii) the acts, practices, or policies of any foreign government which, as a practical matter, unreasonably require that—

(I) substantial direct investment in the foreign country be made,

(II) intellectual property be licensed to the foreign country or to any firm of the foreign country, or

(III) other collateral concessions be made,

(9) Trade in services

(A) The principal negotiating objectives of the United States regarding trade in services are—

(i) to reduce or to eliminate barriers to, or other distortions of, international trade in services, including barriers that deny national treatment and restrictions on establishment and operation in such markets; and

(ii) to develop internationally agreed rules, including dispute settlement procedures, which—

(I) are consistent with the commercial policies of the United States, and

(II) will reduce or eliminate such barriers or distortions, and help ensure fair, equitable opportunities for foreign markets.

(B) In pursuing the negotiating objectives described in subparagraph (A), United States negotiators shall take into account legitimate United States domestic objectives including, but not limited to, the protection of legitimate health or safety, essential security, environmental, consumer or employment opportunity interests and the law and regulations related thereto.

(10) Intellectual property The principal negotiating objectives of the United States regarding intellectual property are—

(A) to seek the enactment and effective enforcement by foreign countries of laws which—

(i) recognize and adequately protect intellectual property, including copyrights, patents, trademarks, semiconductor chip layout designs, and trade secrets, and

(ii) provide protection against unfair competition,

(B) to establish in the GATT obligations—

(i) to implement adequate substantive standards based on—

(I) the standards in existing international agreements that provide adequate protection, and

(II) the standards in national laws if international agreement standards are inadequate or do not exist,

(ii) to establish effective procedures to enforce, both internally and at the border, the standards implemented under clause (i), and

(iii) to implement effective dispute settlement procedures that improve on existing GATT procedures;

(C) to recognize that the inclusion in the GATT of—

is without prejudice to other complementary initiatives undertaken in other international organizations; and

(i) adequate and effective substantive norms and standards for the protection and enforcement of intellectual property rights, and

(ii) dispute settlement provisions and enforcement procedures,

(D) to supplement and strengthen standards for protection and enforcement in existing international intellectual property conventions administered by other international organizations, including their expansion to cover new and emerging technologies and elimination of discrimination or unreasonable exceptions or preconditions to protection.

(11) Foreign direct investment

(A) The principal negotiating objectives of the United States regarding foreign direct investment are—

(i) to reduce or to eliminate artificial or trade-distorting barriers to foreign direct investment, to expand the principle of national treatment, and to reduce unreasonable barriers to establishment; and

(ii) to develop internationally agreed rules, including dispute settlement procedures, which—

(I) will help ensure a free flow of foreign direct investment, and

(II) will reduce or eliminate the trade distortive effects of certain trade-related investment measures.

(B) In pursuing the negotiating objectives described in subparagraph (A), United States negotiators shall take into account legitimate United States domestic objectives including, but not limited to, the protection of legitimate health or safety, essential security, environmental, consumer or employment opportunity interests and the law and regulations related thereto.

(12) Safeguards The principal negotiating objectives of the United States regarding safeguards are—

(A) to improve and expand rules and procedures covering safeguard measures;

(B) to ensure that safeguard measures are—

(i) transparent,

(ii) temporary,

(iii) degressive, and

(iv) subject to review and termination when no longer necessary to remedy injury and to facilitate adjustment; and

(C) to require notification of, and to monitor the use by, GATT Contracting Parties of import relief actions for their domestic industries.

(13) Specific barriers The principal negotiating objective of the United States regarding specific barriers is to obtain competitive opportunities for United States exports in foreign markets substantially equivalent to the competitive opportunities afforded foreign exports to United States markets, including the reduction or elimination of specific tariff and nontariff trade barriers, particularly—

(A) measures identified in the annual report prepared under section 2241 of this title; and

(B) foreign tariffs and nontariff barriers on competitive United States exports when like or similar products enter the United States at low rates of duty or are duty-free, and other tariff disparities that impede access to particular export markets.

(14) Worker rights The principal negotiating objectives of the United States regarding worker rights are—

(A) to promote respect for worker rights;

(B) to secure a review of the relationship of worker rights to GATT articles, objectives, and related instruments with a view to ensuring that the benefits of the trading system are available to all workers; and

(C) to adopt, as a principle of the GATT, that the denial of worker rights should not be a means for a country or its industries to gain competitive advantage in international trade.

(15) Access to high technology

(A) The principal negotiating objective of the United States regarding access to high technology is to obtain the elimination or reduction of foreign barriers to, and acts, policies, or practices by foreign governments which limit, equitable access by United States persons to foreign-developed technology, including barriers, acts, policies, or practices which have the effect of—

(i) restricting the participation of United States persons in government-supported research and development projects;

(ii) denying equitable access by United States persons to government-held patents;

(iii) requiring the approval or agreement of government entities, or imposing other forms of government interventions, as a condition for the granting of licenses to United States persons by foreign persons (except for approval or agreement which may be necessary for national security purposes to control the export of critical military technology); and

(iv) otherwise denying equitable access by United States persons to foreign-developed technology or contributing to the inequitable flow of technology between the United States and its trading partners.

(B) In pursuing the negotiating objective described in subparagraph (A), the United States negotiators shall take into account United States Government policies in licensing or otherwise making available to foreign persons technology and other information developed by United States laboratories.

(16) Border taxes The principal negotiating objective of the United States regarding border taxes is to obtain a revision of the GATT with respect to the treatment of border adjustments for internal taxes to redress the disadvantage to countries relying primarily for revenue on direct taxes rather than indirect taxes.

(Pub. L. 100–418, title I, § 1101, Aug. 23, 1988, 102 Stat. 1121.)

Statutory Notes and Related Subsidiaries

Short Title

Pub. L. 100–418, § 1(a), Aug. 23, 1988, 102 Stat. 1107, provided that: “This Act [see Tables for classification] may be cited as the ‘Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988’.”

Findings and Purposes of Trade, Customs, and Tariff Laws

Pub. L. 100–418, title I, § 1001, Aug. 23, 1988, 102 Stat. 1119, provided that: “(a) Findings.—The Congress finds that—“(1) in the last 10 years there has arisen a new global economy in which trade, technological development, investment, and services form an integrated system; and in this system these activities affect each other and the health of the United States economy; “(2) the United States is confronted with a fundamental disequilibrium in its trade and current account balances and a rapid increase in its net external debt; “(3) such disequilibrium and increase are a result of numerous factors, including—“(A) disparities between the macroeconomic policies of the major trading nations, “(B) the large United States budget deficit, “(C) instabilities and structural defects in the world monetary system, “(D) the growth of debt throughout the developing world, “(E) structural defects in the world trading system and inadequate enforcement of trade agreement obligations, “(F) governmental distortions and barriers, “(G) serious shortcomings in United States trade policy, and “(H) inadequate growth in the productivity and competitiveness of United States firms and industries relative to their overseas competition; “(4) it is essential, and should be the highest priority of the United States Government, to pursue a broad array of domestic and international policies—“(A) to prevent future declines in the United States economy and standards of living, “(B) to ensure future stability in external trade of the United States, and “(C) to guarantee the continued vitality of the technological, industrial, and agricultural base of the United States; “(5) the President should be authorized and encouraged to negotiate trade agreements and related investment, financial, intellectual property, and services agreements that meet the standards set forth in this title [see Tables for classification]; and “(6) while the United States is not in a position to dictate economic policy to the rest of the world, the United States is in a position to lead the world and it is in the national interest for the United States to do so. “(b) Purposes.—The purposes of this title [see Tables for classification] are to—“(1) authorize the negotiation of reciprocal trade agreements; “(2) strengthen United States trade laws; “(3) improve the development and management of United States trade strategy; and “(4) through these actions, improve standards of living in the world.”

Executive Documents

Ex. Ord. No. 12661. Implementing Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 and Related International Trade Matters

Ex. Ord. No. 12661, Dec. 27, 1988, 54 F.R. 779, as amended by Ex. Ord. No. 12697, Dec. 22, 1989, 54 F.R. 53037; Ex. Ord. No. 12716, May 24, 1990, 55 F.R. 21831; Ex. Ord. No. 12774, Sept. 27, 1991, 56 F.R. 49835, provided:

By virtue of the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and laws of the United States of America, including the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 (P.L. 100–418, 102 Stat. 1107) (“Omnibus Trade Act”) [see Short Title note above], the Tariff Act of 1930 (Chapter 497, 46 Stat. 590, June 17, 1930), as amended (“Tariff Act”) [19 U.S.C. 1202 et seq.], the National Defense Authorization Act, Fiscal Year 1989 (P.L. 100–456, 102 Stat. 1918) (“Defense Authorization Act”) [see Tables for classification], section 301 of Title 3 of the United States Code, and, in general, to ensure that the international trade policy of the United States shall be conducted and administered in a way that achieves the economic, foreign policy, and national security objectives of the United States and in a coordinated manner under the direction of the President, it is hereby ordered as follows:

PART I—TRADE, CUSTOMS, AND TARIFF LAWS

Section 1–101. Accession of State Trading Regimes to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade. The functions vested in the President by sections 1106(a), (b) and (d) of the Omnibus Trade Act [19 U.S.C. 2905(a), (b), (d)], regarding the accession of state trading regimes to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, are delegated to the United States Trade Representative.

Sec. 1–201. Wine Barriers. The functions vested in the President by section 1125 of the Omnibus Trade Act [19 U.S.C. 2804 note], regarding the updated report on barriers to wine trade, are delegated to the United States Trade Representative.

Sec. 1–301. Steel Imports. The functions vested in the President by section 805(d)(1) and (2) of the Trade and Tariff Act of 1984 (19 U.S.C. 2253, note), as amended by section 1322 of the Omnibus Trade Act, are delegated to the United States Trade Representative.