T-MINUS 14 DAYS: Trade ministers from the 164 members of the World Trade Organization will be in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, two weeks from today for what could be one of most disappointing ministerial conferences in recent memory. Former WTO spokesperson Keith Rockwell captured the mood in a piece last week for the Hinrich Foundation. “An aura of gloom as dark and dispiriting as any wintry cloud over Lake Geneva shrouds the headquarters of the World Trade Organization,” he wrote. Fish: In an interview with Morning Trade, Rockwell saw little chance that countries would reach a second more comprehensive deal in Abu Dhabi to reduce fishing subsidies, due in large part to unbalanced demands made by India. New Delhi wants “maximum flexibility” to maintain its fishing subsidies and “no flexibility” for developed countries to maintain theirs, he said. Dispute settlement: He ruled out an agreement on dispute settlement reform because everyone knows “the Americans are never going to resolve this before the election.” E-commerce: Rockwell was also glum about chances for members to agree on a continuation of the nearly 26-year-old moratorium on collecting duties on e-commerce transmissions, which former U.S. Ambassador to the WTO Dennis Shea said last week should be the top priority. India, South Africa and Indonesia have been leading the opposition there. To cut to the chase, we’ll quote again from his Hinrich article: “Here’s what we can expect: No deal on agriculture. No deal on fisheries subsidies. No continuation of the moratorium on e-commerce duties. No reform of dispute settlement or the WTO more generally.” Tai on tap today: Against that backdrop, U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai will sit down at noon today with one of her predecessors, Michael Froman, who is now president of the Council on Foreign Relations, to discuss U.S. priorities for MC13 and other issues. DDG Ellard too: Then WTO Deputy Director-General Angela Ellard will give an update on MC13 preparations in remarks to the Washington International Trade Association. Ag talks: Agriculture negotiators are meeting today and tomorrow in Geneva in the hope of finalizing a work program for future negotiations. But in Rockwell’s view it’s unlikely they will reach an agreement in the coming weeks. WTO General Council meeting: Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala will give her assessment of where things stand at a General Council meeting on Wednesday, when we also could learn whether India and South Africa have given up on their push to extend the intellectual property waiver for Covid-19 vaccines to therapeutics and diagnostic products. HOUSE CHINA HAWK GALLAGHER TO RETIRE: Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.), the chair of the hawkish House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, announced Saturday he will retire from Congress at the end of this year. “Electoral politics was never supposed to be a career and, trust me, Congress is no place to grow old. And so, with a heavy heart, I have decided not to run for re-election,” Gallagher said in a statement. The surprising development follows Gallagher’s vote last week against the impeachment of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, despite intense pressure from fellow Republicans. However, Gallagher told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel the intra-party squabble had no role in his decision not to run for a fifth term. Final act: Gallagher also told the Journal Sentinel the House Select Committee has an “aggressive plan” to enact more of its recommendations into law during the final 10 months of the current Congress. That potentially includes revoking permanent normal trade relations with China, a move that former President Donald Trump has said he intends to pursue if returned to the White House in the November election. DEM SENATORS SEEK INFO ON MEXICAN AVOCADO PRODUCTION: A group of Democratic senators led by Peter Welch of Vermont have asked U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai and U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack for more information about the Biden administration’s efforts to address concerns about alleged illegal deforestation and unsustainable water use linked to avocados imported from Mexico. The senators noted that the U.S. and Mexico are currently subject to an Operational Work Plan agreement focused on pest control that requires U.S. and Mexican authorities to certify Mexican avocado orchards that export to the United States. “The Administration should consider expanding the certification requirement to include a review of deforestation impacts, denying certification to orchards installed on recently illegally deforested land — a change that senior Mexican officials have reportedly expressed interest in making,” the senators wrote. They argued that would have minimal impact on current trade because most Mexican avocado orchards are not on recently deforested land. They also requested a staff briefing with USTR and USDA within the next 45 days “to better understand the steps the Administration is taking, and could take in the future, to prevent the sale of avocados in the United States linked to deforestation, unsustainable water use, and violence against Indigenous and other local communities.” COONS PITCHES HIS FUTURE OF TRADE AGENDA: Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) outlined his ideas for reconfiguring international trade policy to support sustainable development in a keynote speech last week at Georgetown University and used the opportunity to make a pitch for the “PROVE IT” climate bill he crafted with Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.). The legislation would require the Energy Department to study the emissions intensity from the manufacturing of certain goods — including aluminum, cement, crude oil, fertilizer, iron, steel, glass and plastic — produced in the U.S. as well as allied countries and adversaries. That information could then be used to assess duties on those goods, although the PROVE IT legislation itself does not authorize that action. The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee easily passed the bill in January, which Coons called “the first step” toward ensuring U.S. workers and producers are “not undercut by dirty competitive products from many countries overseas.” Coons also urged the United States and the European Union to reduce the risk of counterproductive trade actions by harmonizing their “fundamentally different approaches” to encouraging the clean energy transition. In two other areas, he called on the Biden administration to push for strong digital trade rules and to work with Congress on the renewal of the African Growth and Opportunity Act, a trade preference program that expires next year.
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