Mexico says Pacific trade meeting in April, fast track slips

MEXICO CITY, Mexico – A meeting aimed at sealing a Pacific trade deal has been called for April, Mexico’s economy minister said on Tuesday, February 24, adding he was hopeful it would be finalized in the next few months.

“I am very optimistic that there will be good news for the TPP (Trans-Pacific Partnership) in the first half of this year,” Mexico’s Ildefonso Guajardo told Reuters.

A Mexican government official said the meeting would be held at a ministerial level, but offered no details on where or when.

Officials have said the toughest decisions on the TPP would be taken at the end, and a ministerial meeting would signal the end is near.

Trevor Kincaid, a spokesman for the US Trade Representative’s office, said more preparation was needed before ministers were called to the table.

“We have more work to do before we are ready to plan for another ministerial meeting,” Kincaid said in an emailed statement. “We are meeting bilaterally, in small groups, and have a chief negotiator meeting set to continue building on our progress.”

Chief negotiators are due to meet in Hawaii in March.

On Jan. 22, Guajardo said a mid-March deal was “feasible,” though Foreign Minister Jose Antonio Meade said earlier this month he expected the pact to be finalized during the first half of the year.

The TPP would link a dozen Asia-Pacific economies by eliminating trade barriers and harmonizing regulations in a pact covering two-fifths of the world economy and a third of all global trade.

The deal would need US Congressional approval.

Japan’s Economy Minister Akira Amari said on Tuesday talks between Japan and the United States on a two-way trade deal were behind schedule. Such a deal between these two countries would play an important role in the TPP talks.

One hurdle to completing the TPP is that the United States lacks legislation to smooth passage of trade deals through Congress. Orrin Hatch, Republican chairman of the Senate Committee on Finance, said on Tuesday a bill to renew trade promotion authority would probably not be ready this week, according to a Politico report.

Hatch has been negotiating with Ron Wyden, the committee’s leading Democrat, and had hoped to present a bill this month to allow Congress to set negotiating objectives for trade deals in exchange for a yes-or-note vote, without amendments.

Trade supporters are lobbying hard for the bill, which faces opposition from some conservative Republicans as well as some Democrats worried about the effect of trade on jobs.

Some lawmakers and stakeholders have laid out conditions for supporting the deal. For example, 29 mainly Republican lawmakers wrote to US Trade Representative Michael Froman on Feb. 20 warning against different treatment for tobacco.

Malaysia and anti-smoking groups want to exclude tobacco from the pact and continue tariffs on US tobacco products. – With reports from Krista Hughes in Washington DC, USA, Reuters / Rappler.com